Pokémon Reborn: the novelization
by Leirbag15
Summary: As the region of Reborn is just starting to get back on its feet, a mysterious group seems determined to bring it and its citizens down for good. When they strike, then who will then stand up to them? What kind of people will end as the heroes that no one would have hoped them to become?
1. Ari and Vero: A rough welcoming

***I do not own Pokémon, nor Pokémon Reborn for the matter***

***This story is directly inspired from the fangame of the same name***

***Please note that this is a rewrite of Chapter 1, as I found it to be, well, quite bad. I have gotten better with the next chapters, so I wanted to update this one to the same quality as the others. I hope you enjoy this story as much as I did when I wrote it!***

Day 1, 8:00

In the train station, the slightly overweight attendant was patiently waiting for anyone to come at his counter, in order to either validate a ticket or to ask him for information of some kind. He had the look one would expect from a man stuck behind a counter as a way to win his life.

He was pulled out of his boredom-induced lethargy, though, when someone arrived in front of him out of breath, barely being able to stop their momentum in time. The attendant recoiled slightly from the surprise and glared at the newcomer.

It was a rather young-looking woman, or at least he assumed she was. She had quite a well-toned body and she was sporting a pair of baggy grey pants with a white sleeveless shirt, which contrasted a lot with her tanned skin. She then passed her hand through her blonde mohawk before sighing and standing with her hand on the counter.

The older man cleared his throat before averting his gaze and realising that the young woman had gotten a ticket out of a pocket. Taking it, he examined and began to type on the small piece of paper as he asked the ebony blonde a few question.

"Alright. What would be your name, miss?"

"Ari Allaway." She seemed to have mostly regained control of her breathing, opting for slow and deep respiration instead of a quick one. The attendant then continued his interrogation as the sound of typing filled the otherwise silent area.

"Age, Destination?"

"19, Reborn City."

At this, the man stopped moving for a second before lifting his gaze back into the girl's eyes. He had a quite astonished look on his face, his eyebrows raising. His lips tightened a bit before his head dropped a little.

"Listen, young lady… I know that the new Pokémon League has opened and all, but I really advise you to think twice about it." Normally, it would be frowned upon for him to do this kind of thing, but the man felt that the girl needed some kind of reality check.

"The region is still the hellhole it has been since a decade. A lot of trainers are attracted to this kind of novelty, but-"

However, his attempts at reasoning with her were only met with an annoyed glare as she snapped the now completed ticket from his hand.

"Try telling me something I haven't heard a million times yet. I don't think you can, sir. Where is the train?"

After he reluctantly showed her the right direction, he sighed as she prepared to depart.

"Hurry up, miss. It's scheduled to go in five minutes…"

She did not respond to his last piece of advice, but her accelerating pace indicated that she had at least heard him well.

As Ari finally embarked in her designated wagon – the last one of four –, she began to observe its interior a bit. The walls were decorated with a nice, if plain red velvet, with the benches and seats had a similar ornament, but theirs had some motifs. The benches of the wagon were positioned so each would face another, with a wooden table being placed between each pair.

The most notable thing about the wagon, however, was the fact that it was almost entirely empty, with only a young man sharing it with her for the moment. Since she had arrived so close to the departing time, she doubted that anyone else would arrive after her.

She then redirected her gaze to her only companion from this station to Reborn City, who was currently looking out the window with a neutral expression and one of his arms hanging behind his bench, analysing his features a little bit. He looked fairly young, no more than 18 years old, but his face presented quite a sharp nose and chin. His hair was messy and extremely dark, with the dim lights of the wagon and the stronger one coming from the morning sun creating yellow reflections on it. He sported a pair of dark pants with a white shirt which didn't look dissimilar to her own and he wore a black jacket over it, which he kept open, for some reason. Around his neck was some kind of golden chain, although with the general look of the rest of his clothing, she assumed that it was more likely colored this way with some dye instead of a genuine precious metal. Ari also noted that he was quite thin, compared to her more firm body.

At first, she considered leaving him alone and sitting down at some corner, but the prospect of her having to endure this ride without any kind of distraction didn't please her at all. Instead, she would at least try to make some kind of conversation. When she settled on the bench facing his, he seemed momentarily distracted from whatever thoughts he was having. He then observed their surroundings for an instant. Apparently, he hadn't realised yet that they were the only two passengers in this particular part. Once he was finished, he gave Ari a slightly confused look before resuming his blank staring at the window.

Then, the intercom of the wagon emitted a high-pitched beeping sound before a feminine voice came out of it.

"Attention, ladies and gentlemen, we are going to depart in the direction of Reborn City. We ask you to take a seat before the train starts moving. Thank you for embarking on Reborn Rail Lines!"

Sure enough, a few seconds later, the train began to move with a slight screeching sound coming from the friction between the wheels and rails. Once they had picked a little speed and the station was out of view, Ari sighed and stretched a little, making herself comfortable on her seat. The young man in front of her, for his part, glanced once more around them, looking specifically in the numerous empty seats. He then shrugged and began to mess around with a piece of paper, which Ari realised that it was his own ticket.

After a minute of uncomfortable silence, Ari decided to break the ice and smiled at the boy before attempting to start a conversation.

"Hello, young man. The name's Ari, what's yours?" He then diverted his attention from his improvised toy onto Ari as he responded.

"I'm Vero. The future Champion of Reborn."

"So, I guess you want to join the Pokémon League as well, am I right?"

He looked at her, his eyes suddenly lighting up with an unexpected enthusiasm as he nodded.

"Yep. I heard that the new league was quite the challenge, so I figured I would try it out. You know, completing the other leagues just isn't the same thing as before…"

"You've already completed one?" Asked the blonde, crossing her legs as she positioned herself to take most of the bench for herself. It wasn't as if it would bother anyone, anyway.

"No, but I don't see the point in doing so. You know, when Kanto and Johto opened their combined league, it was revolutionary! Beating the league was a big deal, at the time. It took months before anyone defeated the Elite Four!"

"Yeah, but then they got beat by two kids in a row…" Ari added with a smirk, which caused a small giggle from her interlocutor.

"Now, you beat the Elite Four, or even the Champion, and it's nothing. You're just one of many who didn't want to take the job with all its shitty responsibilities…" Rambled the young man, his gaze drafting into his surroundings with no particular fixed point. "But with Reborn, it's different! Trainers from all around the world, with so many gyms!" His smile only grew wider with each passing second. He certainly was passionate, Ari thought.

"Yeah, but when you think about it, isn't it just more of the same?" Asked the ebony blonde, which caused Vero to nod slowly before leaning forward towards her with a smirk.

"Not exactly. I have heard of the stuff they have prepared. There will be a gym for each known type, and they'll all have a battlefield which will advantage them in some way. Personally, I think it's cowardly, but it just makes it more rewarding."

"Yeah, I guess."

Vero then nodded slowly in anticipation before looking back at Ari.

"Are you going to challenge the League as well? Well, I can't see any other reason not to…" He laughed a little, dismissing the question.

"In fact, I am not really going to…" Under Vero's questioning look, she elaborated. "I mean, officially, I will. However, it's an old friend of mine who will challenge the gyms and whatnot." She then re-arranged her hair a bit before continuing. "My kind of thing is more amongst the outdooring side of the trainer thing. Exploring caves, remote areas, you see what I mean?"

"Oh, yes, I guess I do. It's often a good way to find rare Pokémon. You have friends who live in Reborn?"

"I came from there. I and my parents moved out when I was 11 years old."

"I see. Well, if I meet them, we could have a battle, for sure."

Silence imposed itself once again for several minutes afterwards, with both trainers-to-be trying to find ways to entertain themselves before they arrived at their destination.

Occasionally, a discussion would spark out of nowhere, at which occasion Vero and Ari would talk about some recent events in the world, or they would do some trivial talk. However, the topics never quite reached a more personal level, as both interlocutors had plenty of baggage that they weren't willing to share with a complete stranger.

The ride continued like this for almost an hour before the train entered some sort of tunnel into a mountain. Vero looked up as the sudden darkness completely blinded him. Ari, however, could feel her heartbeat accelerate in anticipation, just like someone who would come back home after a long time.

"We're under the Teknite Range." She said.

"Huh?" Although Ari couldn't see her interlocutor's face, his very audible reaction indicated that he didn't know much about Reborn's geography.

"It's a mountain chain in the Northwest of Reborn. We're going to go through the Tourmaline Desert and besides the Scrapyard, then we'll be entering the city."

"Oh, we're almost there, then…" Vero stated, resting his head on one hand. "Although, wasn't some representative supposed to come see us or something?" Vero's voice contained a slight, but discernable amount of annoyance as the train continued to go through the tunnel.

"Well, the desert is vast, I think we still have some time. Besides, it's not like we can't officialise things in the station."

"I guess."

After one more minute, the train had gone out of the mountain and a bright yellow glow came through the windows as they sped through the desert. Vero observed outside, until his eyes caught something peculiar.

It looked like a wild Pokémon, stationed on a nearby rocky formation, who was looking right back at him. Upon observing more, Vero's eyes widened as he realised just what he saw.

Ari noticed the apparent distress the boy suddenly seemed to feel, and she looked outside as well, but couldn't see quite well because of her angle.

"Is something the matter, Vero?" She asked as his face went a bit paler.

"I… I saw an Absol out there…" He muttered, leaving Ari speechless.

Absol, the Disaster Pokémon, with its magnificient white fur. It is mostly seen just before a disaster occurs, hence its nickname. It was believed before that they caused catastrophes themselves, but studies have now proven that they are actually mostly friendly and are only trying to warn humans from their oncoming doom. Ari gulped slightly and took a deep breath before trying to reassure him.

"Well, maybe it's just curious, you know? Absol are like the rest of Pokémon, you never know…"

Although, to say the truth, she wasn't at ease if what Vero had seen was accurate. She had never heard of wild Absol in Reborn before, so this may be a bad sign…

"If you say so."

As Vero finished speaking, however, the front door of their wagon suddenly opened, at which point both Vero and Ari noticed that there were closed connections between each of them. Through it came a woman, of white skin and even whiter hair, and who had a very simple white shirt and grey pants ensemble, and she came right for the seated duo – at the same time, Ari thought, where else could she have wanted to go? She sat beside Ari, who moved a bit to the side in order to make her some place.

The woman then proceeded to take the paperwork she had been carrying around and deposited them on the small table between the two seats. She looked through it and looked over to Ari.

"Hello, trainers. I am Ame, the manager of the brand-new Reborn Pokémon League, glad to make your acquaintance. We are just going to have to confirm the information I have in these…" She began with Vero's. "Here, in the cases of the people to contact in case of emergency, you have left that blank. Is that an error?"

All of a sudden, Vero's face turned hard and his look abruptly went on some random fixated point in space.

"No."

Ame nodded. She didn't need to press further.

"Besides that, I'll let you review the rest of your personal info…" She then took the rest of the papers and handed them to Ari. "… And I'll do the same with you."

After a minute or two, both wannabe trainers had completed their respective corrections and had given back the papers to Ame.

"Alright, it's always great to see some new talent coming into Reborn. I'm certain that the League will be a thorough success!"

"I certainly hope so…" Vero said, smirking. "I didn't come all the way down here to waste my time."

"Of course, some Gym Leaders might be difficult to access at the start, but these are issues that are currently being taken care of." Ame stated, which caused Vero to frown a little bit.

"Hey, look!" Ari said, pointing to the window. "We can even see the city from here now! Even the Beryl Bridge…" She continued to look, remarking that the walls of the city were getting closer.

A bit too close.

"Why aren't we slowing down, already?" Vero asked, visibly unnerved.

Ame's eyes widened and looked one last time outside. They had just passed the city walls at breakneck speeds.

The only thing she could do now was to grab both would-be trainers and put them to the floor before the imminent crash.

**Since this is one of my first stories, and the only one I've publicly published, feedback would be really appreciated. I am still mostly unaware of the flaws that would be obvious to readers, so don't hesitate to tell me what you thought of this.**

**Positive, negative, as long as it is constructive.**


	2. Vero: Young apprentice and pretty boy

Day 1, 8:30

Just after Ame had put them down, Vero felt and heard the train stopping dead in its tracks as it rammed through the station and then literally exploded. Following the three of them being thrown across the wagon by the sudden stop, Vero could feel a throbbing pain in his abdomen, which had hit the side of a seat. However, he was still able to get on his knees and evaluate his surroundings.

Ari laid motionless on the floor, a terrifying and sickening red coloring her blonde head and her white shirt. Vero took a few, difficult steps, to get her and try to drag her out of the wagon, which was beginning to catch in fire.

Fortunately, Ame was there as well, and she lifted Ari without too much trouble. Under the effects of the adrenaline being pumped inside of him, Vero's pain had diminished enough to allow him to swiftly escape without much delay either.

As he went to the exit, a couple rescuers were already there, ready to help him get to safety. As he walked away from the debris, Vero could hear screams coming from the more crowded wagons, and when he took a look, all he could see were scrap metal and gravely wounded or deceased people being transported by interveners.

As Vero sat down on an exterior bench, just outside of the station, he saw a blonde, gothic-style girl running to Ame and Ari and checking on the latter. He assumed she is the friend that Ari was talking about.

Soon enough, after the wave of panicked family members and corpse bags passing by, Vero noticed a green-haired woman, dressed in bright yellow clothes, who inexplicably had equally flashy yellow pom-poms hanging from her hip. She was looking at the wreckage with her hands on her sides, whistling. Contrary to what the scene would normally evoke to anyone normal, she seemed amused, excited even.

"Wow that was awesome! This is easily the prettiest kaboom I've seen in a while…"

The bitch had begun talking for three seconds, and already Vero could tell that he wasn't going to like her. Then, Ame came back from where the more heavily injured people were kept and went to meet the apparent explosion enthusiast. She clearly wasn't in the mood to joke at the moment.

"Julia. While I am sure that you are not behind this at all, it is far from the right time to admire the enemy's work." She spoke calmly, but she was almost literally fuming with anger right now. Julia, on the other hand, seemed to realize her insensitive attitude and her face hardened in a guilty frown.

Ame then turned to one of the policemen who had arrived on the scene. Well, one who's Growlithe wasn't searching through the wreckage for survivors.

"YOU" The poor guy basically jumped as the manager's voice exploded behind him. After he regained his composure and wiped the drop of cold sweat, she asked her question. "Have the culprits been identified yet?"

"No, but the area has been closed off. If they were here, they will have no way of escaping."

"Great. Just… great."

"How's Ari?" Vero asked, with a glint of worry in his eyes. Ame looked at where she had been brought and weakly smiled in an attempt to reassure the boy.

"She's been hit pretty hard, but she'll get better. Besides, her friend is already there to take care of her. You need not to worry." She then lowered her head and took a deep breath before rejoining the other rescuers.

After the white-haired woman was gone, the one she referred to as 'Julia' sighed and approached Vero, her smile having come back on her visage, although she now also had a much more caring look in her eyes. He, for his part, simply looked up at her, with his hand on his aching stomach.

"And you, do you need help, boy? Not too badly hurt?"

As an answer, Vero first raised his free hand and held his thumb up.

"I'll be alright, I'm just a bit winded." He then proceeded to get up, as fast as his abdomen would let him, anyway. Julia raised an eyebrow, unconvinced.

"Nuh-uh. You're not pulling that one on me." Then, her energy from less than one minute ago seemed to surge back into her body. "You're a challenger, right? Come with me. There's a center at the Great Hall. You'll even get your own starter there! Isn't it cool?"

Vero did remember that he was supposed to go to a place named like that upon arrival, so he opted to go with the overly-enthusiast girl, even though his pain was already mostly gone by now.

As the two began to walk away from the incident, Vero observed his surroundings. They were on a paved pathway going by what looked like a lake on their right. However, instead of fresh-looking, plain blue water, it was filled with a sickening mix of purple and brown, just as if sewage had been dropped there for decades. On their left, there was a high fence separating the path from the neighboring habitats, and Vero could quickly determine that it wasn't a particularly rich area, to say the least. The walls of the duplexes were worn out by the elements, and the roads were plagued by fissures and holes.

"So, what's your experience in raising Pokémon?" Julia said. Vero looked at her, with a slight frown, before responding.

"It's my own damn business." Vero wasn't exactly in the mood to answer this kind of question right now. At least, not until this mess had been taken care of.

"But you know how to handle one, riiight˞?" She then pointed a finger in the air while she closed her eyes. "You're going to try to fight the best of the best, here in Re-"

"I KNOW…" After clearing his throat, Vero calmed himself and continued. "… How to train a Pokémon. I would be stupid to come here if I didn't." Julia decided not to push the subject any further.

"_Seriously, who does she think I am?"_ He thought, as the Great Hall came in view. As they approached it, he took some time to observe it.

This building was what some people could call a monument. Its roof had a tiny, grey dome, from which four dark pillars descended to the ground, in a semi-circular fashion. Between those, the walls of the Great Hall sported the colors of Reborn City's official symbol. The north-west portion was in blue, the southern-west was green, the southern-east was purple, and the northern-east was red. From what Vero could recall, each of these colors were supposed to represent some kind of values, but he didn't bother to remember the details.

As they came closer to the entrance, he noticed that the main doors were similarly decorated, with four vertical stripes taking the four official colors of the region. However, in front of the door, there was a girl waiting.

She was rather tall, even more so than Vero. She wore what looked like the yin and yang, if it had been a kimono, with the top part being white, with long and loose sleeves, and a dark belt and dark, baggy pants. Her long, dark mane of hair contrasted quite a lot with her top.

She was waiting with her hands joined in front of her, while standing with a certain aura of grace around her. She noticed the duo walking up to the main doors and waved to Julia, or so Vero presumed, at least. Julia, for her part, excitedly saluted her back and accelerated her course.

"Hey, Julia!"

"Victoria! So you have finally decided to give it a try?" The green-haired woman had placed both her hands on her hips and leaned her body forward, which gave Vero a quick view of her quite shapely backside. It took quite a lot of willpower for him not to take a look, even though he didn't lack it.

"Well, on Kiki's orders, but yes. Although it seems that I've chosen my moment… rather badly?" Victoria's face contorted into a slight grimace as she looked at the rising smoke coming from the station's direction.

"Don't worry, girl, you couldn't possibly know! Besides, there's more than enough paperwork for you and this guy here…" She pointed to Vero behind her with her thumb. "… And Ame should be back pretty soon. I'll just bring you to the technicians, and I'll be on my way."

"Yeah, you do have a gym to take care of, after all." Vero's eyes widened a little in surprise as he heard this. Julia? A Gym Leader? Well, to be fair, Gym Leaders all across the globe had a tendency to be pretty quirky people.

Julia nodded and sighed in a melodramatic manner.

"Ugh, and I'm surely going to be of clean-up duty, or maybe exploding-the-bad-guys duty, if I'm lucky." Her head then lowered. "I'll need a freakin' coffee."

After their small chat, Julia brought them inside. Immediately, Vero noticed that the interior was actually quite crowded, for the relative size of the Hall. The walls all around were also bright white, enhanced by the strong lighting. On the left of the entrance, there was a red counter, behind which could be seen a nurse and the typical Pokémon Center equipment, such as the standard healing machine. On the right, there was instead a mini-market, but Vero couldn't see on its shelves anything else than cheap, unreliable equipment – except for the usual status-removing meds, these were always useful.

In the middle of the Hall, there were several chairs scattered around, with a television in the middle of it all for the people waiting to watch. At the moment, most of the crowd was assembled there, watching the live news about the train crash. Vero could faintly hear the reporter ending her newscast, naming herself 'Gossip Gardevoir'. Not exactly an unusual name for a reporter, Vero thought.

Once they passed the seats and tv, Julia dropped Vero and Victoria near the technicians of the Reborn League. They were passed some documents on which they had to fill certain blanks, the usual stuff.

Once they were finished, they were told to wait until Ame came back, so she could bring them to the starter room. As they sat on some of the chairs near the wall, Victoria glanced over at Vero, but she stayed silent. He realised that Julia had completely forgot to show him the human's infirmary. Good thing he did not really need it.

After a few minutes of waiting, Vero noticed Ame arriving at the counter. She was much calmer than how he'd last seen her. She talked a little with one of the attendants, and then redirected her attention to the two young adults. She joined her two hands together in a clap, relieved to do something a bit less intense.

"So, who will come first upstairs with me?"

Vero quickly turned to Victoria, nonverbally asking her to let go first. The kimono-wearing girl simply shrugged and obliged.

The young man jumped from his seat and followed Ame, as they entered a restricted area, then climbed up some stairs. He could feel his heart beat harder with each second passing from excitement, and for the first time since the train crash, he had a genuine smile on his face.

Receiving his first official Pokémon brought up the child in him, and he was absolutely loving it!

When they finally arrived to the door of the room and opened it, Vero took a deep breath in.

There were three long tables, each of green, red or blue color. On each, there were seven Pokéballs placed in line. Starter Pokémon, chosen from seven different regions, the choice would have probably been pretty hard…

If Vero hadn't made his choice already, of course.

He walked up to the table where the fire-type starters were scattered, and from the closest edge of it, he took the Ball.

"You want to pick Charmender?" Ame asked, patiently waiting at the doorframe.

As a response, the young man only nodded slowly and tightened his grip around the capsule.

Charmender. The Flame Pokémon, which would eventually evolve into the terrifying Charizard. Their line was known for its drive for good fights and power, as well as for its pride, which Vero figured would make it a perfect partner for him.

He then pressed on the button on the Pokéball and let the Charmender out. In a flash of bright light, the little orange lizard was standing before him, observing his features with curiosity and waving his tail around like an excited Lillipup would.

The new trainer kneeled in order to pet his new Pokémon, but his gesture was mostly met with indifference from the little guy. Ame then came over to him with a few items in her arms.

"Well, Vero, now that you have made your choice, I will be able to give you your basic equipment for your journey." She first gave him a recognisable small red device, with a little holographic screen on it. "First of all, your Pokédex, with all known species pre-recorded inside. It will give more info on those you capture." She then gave him a little phone-like thingy. "And next, your Pokégear, with the map of Reborn inside." Vero quickly put those in his small backpack before he got ready to go downstairs with his new companion.

"Alright, buddy, come on, we have a journey to begin!" The boy exclaimed, raising his right fist into the air triumphantly, with his new Charmender jumping in excitement. The little creature emitted some guttural noise that, coupled with its big, round eyes, made it utterly adorable. Vero then realised that his current pose was quite childish, and he immediately took his normal stance.

"Vero, can we go now? Victoria is waiting and I have other things to attend to after we're done."

Vero acquiesced and began descending, with Charmender bouncing from step to step. As they arrived on the main floor, Victoria and her kimono were waiting in front of the technicians' counter and waved at Vero as he came into view, followed by the trainer gladly waving back.

"Oh, so you've chosen Charmender? A good fighter, I may say…" She continued to examine the Flame Pokémon which the boy had chosen as his trusted partner. "Have you decided on a name for him… or her?"

Vero's eyes opened a little more than usual in surprise before getting out his Pokédex and pointing it on his Pokémon, confirming that it was indeed a male. As for the name…

"Well, I don't have much of an idea… I called him buddy just two minutes ago, so I might as well call him that. What do you think, Buddy?" As an answer, the newly-dubbed 'Buddy' tilted his head to the side and looked at Vero and Victoria in quick succession.

"I'll take that as an 'okay', then." He decided. He then glanced at the kimono girl. "Have you already decided on your own?"

"Yes, I have, since some time, even. We could do a battle once I come back?" She suggested. Vero nodded approvingly before going to the Center in order to check out the place a bit. Once he was near the counter, however, a voice suddenly made itself known a few meters away.

"Heeeeyy˞" Vero quickly turned at the stranger. "You look like you've just gained your starter, am I right?"

The guy who had just addressed him – well, at least he sounded like a guy – was dressed mostly in purple, specifically his jacket, pants and his fishnet garments, which were the only thing offering coverage to his otherwise exposed chest and belly. While he wasn't particularly muscular, he wasn't as thin as Vero either. His hair, of which color was pretty much the same color as his general color scheme, formed an enormous mass of purple in front of his right eye. He also wore pretty big, black boots, with what Vero was pretty sure was thicker-than-average soles, and he had, of all things, a crucifix hanging around his neck.

The guy's unique – and fabulous – appearance made Vero expect to see some kind of warrior ghost appear besides him, for some odd reason.

"Yeah, I did, I was going to make him visit the place before we begin our training." The guy in purple nodded.

"So, you're challenging the League, like me." He then raised his right hand forward and smiled at Vero. "The name's Cain, by the way."

"Vero." He then shook his hand firmly, before Cain spoke again.

"Since we're both going to start a journey anew, what would you say about a little sparring match?"

At this, both Vero and Buddy's eyes widened before a smirk appeared on the chain-wearing trainer's face.

"Alright, I'm game." He then pointed his chin at the door. "Let's take this outside. Wouldn't want to make a mess."

"Oh-ho, my…" Cain then put a hand on his chest, jokingly flustered. "I must say, that's not a sentence I hear very often…"

Vero, who had already begun walking towards the doors, stopped right in his track, processing his would-be opponent's phrase, before lowering his head and letting out a few defeated giggles, before both of them went in the open and then to one of the small arenas around the Hall. It was a rather simple terrain, just dry ground. No kind of Pokémon would normally have an advantage over this.

The new trainer Vero commanded his Charmender to take place in front of him, at the edge of the arena, while Cain went to the other side. He grabbed a Pokéball from a small bag he had on his back and then opened it.

What came out of it was a male Nidoran, indicated by his purple color – yikes, this guy just loves this color, doesn't he? A rather rare species, poison-type. Vero concluded that the type matchup was even between them. The little Nidoran then braced itself for battle as Buddy did the same, before the two trainers glared at each other's eyes.

"Whenever you're ready, Cain."

"I always am, you'll learn soon enough."

Vero could feel his heartbeat increasing in loudness again. He had already done battles in the past, but this was the first one done with his own Pokémon.

Then, all of a sudden, Cain swung his arm in a circular pattern as he struck a battle pose.

"Go on, use Peck!"

Upon hearing his master's orders, Nidoran then sprinted towards Buddy, with the Charmender having barely enough time to dodge the incoming attack. A white spear passed right by him and he then had to jump in order to avoid it again. This time, however, Vero was ready.

"Buddy, use Growl!"

The Charmender obeyed and let out a small cry, which had the desired effect of lowering the Nidoran's attack power. He did not give up, however, and he kept hurling towards Buddy with its Scratch attack.

"Now, counter his Peck with Scratch!"

Vero knew that the Charmender he was given would be well-trained in interacting with humans, but not at all for battling. As a consequence, the little guy probably didn't know of any other techniques apart from the most basic, and maybe not even the move Ember. That meant that he would have to use only the very rudimentary Growl and Scratch against the seemingly similarly-experienced Nidoran.

The two Pokémon entered a blade block, with each of them trying to overpower the other. However, even with his reduced power, Nidoran was able to clash evenly with Buddy, which made Vero a bit worried.

"Okay, Nidoran, now, use Leer!"

"_Oh, shit!"_ Thought Vero. Indeed, profiting of the proximity – and immobility – of the two fighters, Nidoran had taken the opportunity to lower Charmender's guard.

Buddy's defense fell!

"Now, Peck!"

The poison-type then rushed towards Buddy. With the Flame Pokémon's lowered guard, the statistics weren't in Vero's favor anymore. Fortunately, Vero and his Pokémon were quick to react, this time.

"Buddy, dodge and use Scratch!"

The small lizard then effortlessly jumped out of the way, and took advantage of Nidoran having to stop and turn around to strike multiple times with his sharp claws. Vero had noticed that, while his opponent was undeniably stronger than usual, he was also sloppy in his movements, which made it easy to counterattack.

After successfully hitting his foe three times, Charmender managed to launch him into the air, and the Nidoran was now visibly winded. Cain then frowned and raised an arm.

"Okay, alright, no need to continue. You've won."

Vero took a second to process what his adversary just said, then he slightly grimaced and nodded, calling back his Charmender to his side. The little guy was exalted and looked up to his trainer with a smile, which Vero returned. To be completely honest, the Nidoran didn't look completely down just yet, and it stung a bit that his opponent didn't let him win legitimately, but hey. At least, he won.

After Cain returned his tired Pokémon in his Pokéball, he and Vero proceeded to shake hands.

"Not bad, for a beginner." The purple-clothed boy said, brushing his hair. Vero then lifted an eyebrow.

"'Not bad'? I've defeated you fair and square. I think you're underselling it." He even pointed an accusatory finger at Cain, for added effect.

"Well, it is far from my first battle, you just battled my Pokémon who had the least combat experience, that's all. In any case, you reacted well."

"Yeah, I guess." Vero redirected his hand on his chest, faking modesty.

"Anyway, I should heal him, now. You coming back inside?"

Vero shrugged and nodded. It's not like there was anything better to do outdoors, even the view wasn't the prettiest one. From where they were, they could see polluted water extend on a pretty long distance. Plus, he had promised Victoria a battle too.

Once they arrived inside, they immediately went for the Pokémon Center, at which both trainers gave their respective Pokémon to heal. Charmender hadn't taken much damage, but he had needed quite a lot of energy to avoid Nidoran's attacks and clash with him.

When Vero turned around, he could see Victoria who was watching the television, with the rest of the crowd. He could briefly see the captions on the screen, which said that apparently, the train crash was a terrorist attack. Turning his head around, Vero could also see Ame, who was seemingly responding to some kind of call.

After the scoop was finished, Victoria turned back and saw Vero and Cain who had just received their Pokémon back. She then walked to them and waved her hand to salute them.

"Wow, have you seen what happened at the train station? I didn't think it was this bad." She didn't have the smile Vero had seen her with before, replaced by a worried grimace. In guise of an answer, Cain and Vero awkwardly nodded.

"Yeah, I know, I was in there. Wasn't pretty." He then ignored the shocked expressions of his two interlocutors in favor of changing the subject.

"Anyway, I had promised you something, I think, didn't I?"

"Y-yes…" Victoria's mood slowly returned to a more formal and relaxed one. "And what's with him?" She pointed to Cain as she spoke. "You can't even wait for two minutes before ditching me?" Cain then took the chance to interrupt.

"Oh, sorry, then. We just had some fun, outside. I must say, he really gave me quite the pounding." Vero then glanced sideways in the purple boy's direction, before slapping his hand over his face, while Victoria playfully giggled.

"Oh, is that so? Didn't think you swung this way, Vero…"

"I'm not… urgh, whatever." He could only cross his arms in defeat before continuing the conversation. "Can we just go do our battle already?"

"Oh, yeah, sure. Sorry…" Victoria still let out a few laughs before following Vero outside, while Cain went to register for the Pokémon League.

Once outside, they took the same space that Vero and Cain had taken for their precedent duel. The chain-wielding trainer let out his Charmender, while the kimono girl released her own starter: a Litten. Vero was a little surprised by her choice. Sure, they were cute and quite fast, for their level of power, but they evolved into the much bulkier, slower and, most importantly, manlier Incineroar. Although, having only known this girl for less than an hour, he shouldn't really pretend to know her enough to judge her preference in Pokémon.

Eager to fight, Buddy was stomping his foot to the ground in anticipation, while the opposing Litten mostly acted uninterested, preferring to lick its paw than to actually pay attention to its foe.

"Alright, the battle is on!" Vero exclaimed, trying to take advantage of the Litten's apparent carelessness. This time, he would take the initiative.

"Buddy, use Scratch!" Upon receiving the order, the Flame Pokemon drew his white energy blades on his claws and displayed them menacingly on his sides, before he attacked the Litten…

… Which easily dodged the attack, before it jumped over the Charmender and Victoria ordered it to use the same attack. Buddy was caught by surprise and was projected a few centimeters back, fortunately staying on his feet.

Vero grumbled. He preferred to have the advantage in agility rather than strength, and he was getting worried that he would be forced into the role of the heavyweight for this time.

"Alright, stay in place, Buddy, and prepare you Scratch attack." He didn't bother with using Growl, this time. He suspected that Litten could use Leer as well, and if it was the case, then he would simply have wasted both his and Victoria's time. He would use it, though, if his opponent used their status move first.

The two Pokémon then entered in a staring contest, with Charmender keeping his ground and waiting to counterattack whatever Litten attempted, while the latter tried to find a way to out-smart the lizard. Suddenly, Vero had a realisation for breaking the standoff.

"_You know what? Fuck it…"_ Vero thought, before yelling. "Buddy! Growl!"

The attack functioned according to Vero's plan, with Litten's attack power being reduced. Of course, Victoria ordered the use of Leer to even the odds, but Vero had what he wanted.

"Buddy, rush and use Scratch as much as you can!"

Charmender then began to chase after the feline, which struggled to keep a safe distance from the Scratch-wielding reptile, and once Buddy was about to land a sure hit, Litten tried to clash, only for the Charmender to push him away like a ragdoll.

Indeed, even though the damages dealt between the two fighters were now even, with the combination of Growl and Leer, Litten's attack had lowered, while Buddy's hadn't. In other words, the Charmender had the undeniable advantage in any clash the two would have, and Buddy was still agile enough so that Litten couldn't simply dance around him and easily defeat him by scratch damage – figuratively and literally.

Vero smirked at his own strategy, but he grew worried when Victoria was having a smug smile of her own.

"Oh, you think I would let myself be cornered so easily? Litten, use Ember!"

"WHAT?"

Vero briefly panicked as a ball of fire had engulfed his Charmender. While the attack wasn't effective, due to being fire-type, it still meant that Victoria could completely bypass her Litten's strength disadvantage – and by the same occasion, using Vero distance-keeping tactics against himself. After he regained his composure, Vero took a decision – a predictable one, but a decision nonetheless.

"Alright, Buddy, resume chasing Litten! Don't give it room to breathe!"

Obeying his master's order's, Buddy prepared his Scratch and resumed his chase. The feline was fast and quite agile, but it couldn't dodge forever, and with the Charmender running after it, it didn't have the time to throw its Ember attack most of the time, and even when it did, the damages done were minimal.

Eventually, Litten made a mistake during one of its jumps and Buddy could finally strike a clean hit, the first one he did in the match. However, the little cat Pokémon was far from done, and its fur raised up as it hissed, ready to unleash all it had.

Before Charmender could run after it again, it jumped right to Buddy's face, taking both him and his trainer by surprise, and used Ember right on his face, and then, when the Flame Pokémon tried to counter, it swiftly jumped before coming back and striking two successive Scratch attacks, knocking him right off his feet.

Seeing that his Charmender was badly losing, and struggling to even get up, Vero tightened his fist and let out an angry sigh.

"Alright, that's enough…" Victoria immediately ordered her Litten to stop and Vero went to retrieve his hurt partner and took him in his arms.

"You alright, there?" He asked, and the Charmender emitted a little groan, nodding. After mumbling about how unfair his loss was, since Victoria had access to Ember and he didn't, he turned to the girl, who gave him a respectful bow. He nodded once in order to kind of return the gesture, then the two walked inside in order to get their Pokémon healed.

At the counter, Victoria approached Vero.

"You know, you fought very well, the two of you. Hadn't I have Ember, I could very well have lost."

"Yeah, thanks. You're pretty good, too…" Vero admitted, in spite of his frustration. Although he was quite sore about the fight, he couldn't help but feel begrudging respect for her. She had legitimately out-smarted him, and while he could make up for it later, for now she had proven her worth.

Once they received their respecting Pokémon back, Vero released his Charmender and the two trainers saluted each other before Victoria went off. At this moment, Cain came back with Ame.

"Hey, my man, how did the fight go?"

"Pretty well, she was good…" Cain's eyebrow lifted at Vero's vague response.

"She beat you, didn't she?"

"…"

"Don't worry." Came Ame's voice. "Everyone loses from times to times, besides, with both your Pokémon being beginners, it could have gone either way."

Vero slowly nodded and smiled.

"Well, I guess I'll be on my way, then. I have some training to do with Buddy, right?"

Buddy then proceeded to make some growls which could be described as 'happy Charmender noises', before Vero saluted Ame and Cain as well before going his own way.

"Well, now I guess I should go too." Cain said with a smile. "Good luck with the investigation."

"Oh, thank you." Ame replied. "We have already caught a suspect, I'm going to the interrogatory."

"Oh, well, then, I guess a good part of the job is done. Later!"

"Later." After saying this, Ame went to a heavily-restricted area behind the counters, and went down the stairs. Once she arrived, she recognised a few police officers and, on the other side of a one-way mirror, a weirdly-clothed individual was kept captive with an inspector, a Torkoal and two guards also present in the room.

"Commence." Ame stated, her expression having become from warm and caring to cold and unforgiving.

On the other side of the glass, the inspector received the message and got up to talk to the captive.

"Alright, you must have thought you were pretty funny, today, causing this pretty firework, did you?"

The prisoner looked back at him with a mix of contempt and anger in his eyes. He was clothed in gray all over his body, with black gloves and boots, and a hoodie. He looked like a cheap attempt for a ninja mixed with… something.

After he refused to talk, the inspector went on.

"You're pretty dumb, though, to have used a short-range detonator to do the deed. One would think that your group would at least try to be competent – speaking of, we will also need you to give us information about it"

At this moment, the prisoner's silence broke.

"Never! I wouldn't give you that for anything!"

The interrogator nodded slowly while the two guards looked at each other, shaking their heads in hindsight of what would come next.

"Listen, I do not have all day, and neither does my friend Torkoal here. Now, here's the thing: my friend isn't exactly a patient fellow like myself." When he spoke, the Pokémon began to walk over closer to the terrorist. "Now, what do you think your chair is made of?"

"Uuuh, metal?"

"Good, then you're not hopelessly stupid. Now, do you know what happens when metal heats up?"

The prisoner's eyes widened as the realisation came to his mind. He began to try to break his confinement, without success.

"N-NO! I'll never betray them! I swore!"

The inspector simply lowered his head.

"Suit yourself."

The Torkoal then went under the man's chair and soon, inhuman screams of agony filled the interrogation room, while Ame's eyes remained as merciless as they had been before.

**So, what did you think of this? Like the introduction of both Victoria and Cain? Did the battles feel good enough? Don't hesitate to tell!**


	3. Alice and Ari: Overdue reunion

Day 1, 11:30

After all of the loud mess at the train station, Alice foolishly thought that the silence of a hospital room would be welcome.

Oh boy, was she wrong…

Now, here she was. Sitting in a deathly white room on an uncomfortable miniature bench, watching her friend suffer, made her want to throw up. The screams and cries had been replaced by the eerie mumbling of the various medical equipment, and the fires and scrap metal by four walls and a bed of an unnatural white.

In other words, not exactly how she had planned her morning to go.

Alice snapped back from her reverie at the sounds of Ari's pained moans, bringing her hand to her forehead, which was covered in a blood-stained bandage. The Goth then brought her own hand to her chest as she grabbed her friend's free one with the other. After a minute of further silence, Ari sighed and looked at Alice before beginning to speak.

"Well, how are you doing, Al?"

Alice then frowned a little, before responding.

"Considering I am currently watching over my injured bestie, not that much."

"Well, I think it's good, considering we're not at the morgue."

The gothic blonde sighed as her heart suddenly felt as if it was three times as heavy as before. Decidedly, Ari had retained her ability to snark at any and every opportunity. An uncomfortable silence fell once again, before Alice decided to address the Donphan in the room.

"So, Ari, I guess you intended on keeping… _that_ a surprise?"

At this, the ebony blonde nervously chuckled, closing her eyes and lifting both her eyebrows.

"Well, that was the plan, yes. I didn't think it appropriate to talk about it on the phone." Ari then lifted her head a bit in order to look at Alice directly in the eye. "I knew that this would be a big deal, so I didn't want to treat it like it was nothing." The Goth could only nod slowly, recognising that what her friend told her was true.

However, it still took a good deal of time to make up her mind around the fact that the friend that had went away so long ago had become, well, Ari. However, the fact that she was currently bedridden by a possible concussion was a more immediate problem.

"Anyways, had you already chosen what kind of Pokémon you were going to choose?" Ari asked, deciding to change the subject. "Mine's gonna be Turtwig. Such cuties." Of course, the explorer would take a Pokémon that's basically a miniature landscape, Alice thought.

"Mine is going to be either Piplup or Oshawott, I haven't chosen yet."

Ari acquiesced a bit before continuing the discussion.

"After we get our starters, what do we do? I mean, we can't go straight to the gyms, and I really want to get out of the city."

"I think it would be a great idea. I don't really need to stick around much longer either."

Ari then turned her head towards her friend.

"Is your family still in Peridot?" Alice then nodded, causing Ari to frown, her mouth contorting downwards.

At this moment, a doctor came into the room with some equipment. She explained to Alice that she was going to perform some tests in order to see if there was any need for treatments for Ari's injuries. She then proceeded to make the ebony girl read some letters of various sizes from a certain distance, making her repeat sentences to make sure she could hear well, etc. Once asked to get up in order to test her balance, while she could feel a headache, Ari was still able to stand still and without help.

"Alright…" The doctor wrote some notes on her documents. "You won't need to stay overnight, but you need to limit your activities until your symptoms get better." Ari became a bit worried about the last part of this sentence.

"And… what kind of activities, exactly?"

"Pretty much anything that is either physically, mentally or emotionally demanding, such as sports, video games, or reading."

Upon hearing this, Ari let out an exasperated sigh and let herself fall into the mattress of the bed in the most melodramatic manner, only to wince in pain because of the strain the action had caused to her brain. The doctor and Alice both face palmed in reaction.

"I will make sure she doesn't do anything stupid, you can trust me." The Goth assured, in an attempt to reassure the doctor.

A few minutes and another rambling of Ari's later, the two friends were able to get out of the only – medium quality – hospital in the Peridot Ward and to slowly walk to Alice's mother's apartment.

Peridot was not a nice place to live in by any means. Public services, such as running water and electricity, were constantly being cut because someone couldn't pay for it. The buildings themselves weren't really better, eroded by the rain and the wind, or by the occasional Pokémon battle, with some apartments obviously lacking a part of the roof, replaced with some planks. The numerous alleys were either half-stuffed with garbage, or a homeless person had erected some kind of refuge, if a gang hadn't claimed the place already. This was one of the biggest problems: If you were lucky enough, the local street gang may be willing to offer some kind of protection against other groups if you paid them a small fee, but in the other case, you would have to worry about the issues of drug dealers and pimps, making you wish another gang took over.

Yeah, no wonder Ari's parents went out of this hellhole.

However, in a sense, it was still home for Alice. Even though she hadn't registered for the Pokémon League, she was quite a skilled trainer, and most thugs knew to leave her alone. Some of them learned it the hard way. Even Alice, though, knew that she couldn't stand up to everyone, and there were some that she needed to avoid. She suspected that Ari did not approve of her still living there, but she simply couldn't leave, there were people who depended on her.

After a few moments of walking, Ari began to talk again.

"I wonder if people will still recognize me over there…"

"I don't know either. Would you, though?" Alice shrugged as she said this. She was sure, however, that at least her mother would see that it's her best friend Ari.

Once in a while, Alice would see some shady guy or girl looking at them, only to avert their gaze. Peridot in general wasn't great, and Alice lived in the absolute worst part of it, so she needed to be on the lookout. After all, strong trainer or not, what good was it if your opponent didn't even give you the chance to defend yourself?

After some more walking, Alice's apartment building finally came into view. It didn't stand out in any way. Just another stack of rooms like any other in the capital.

Approaching the entrance, one guy standing close looked over to the two girls and slightly smiled before doing a down nod, which Alice gave back. They then took the stairs before going to a dirty corridor, and then finally entering Alice's 'home'.

It was actually quite different from what Ari had been expecting, if she had to tell the truth. The place was arranged and while there was dust, some Pokéfood laying everywhere on the floor and some leftovers on the kitchen's table, it was generally cleaner than what you would think of a Peridot apartment. The door of the place went directly to the living room, where an old television could be seen with an old couch sitting in the opposite side of the room. On the right, there was a connection to the kitchen while the left led to two rooms, presumably Alice and her mom's bedrooms. The walls were covered with a weird light orange, with a cheap painting here and there offering some kind of decoration.

"I guess your mom's not at home right now?" Ari spoke, her voice echoing on the walls. Alice shook her head.

"No, she has work today."

"_Yeah, 'work'…"_ Ari thought.

After letting out a heavy breath, the ebony blonde slowly sat on the couch, searching for the remote controller. Once she found it between two of the couch's cushions, Alice promptly snapped it from her hands, much to her displeasure.

"No, the doctor said no tiring activity."

"But she didn't mention _TV in particular_!" Ari exclaimed, before she closed an eye in pain, her raising her voice apparently counting as a 'tiring activity'. She let out another long sigh of exasperation before giving up. "Alright, I'll just go to the kitchen, I'm starving…"

"Fine, I'll try to find something for you, but first…" Alice then opened her room's door, on which a couple small hits could have been heard. From inside came out a Minccino and a Buneary. Both Pokémon then came to Alice's side and the Buneary rubbed its head affectionately on its owner's leg. Then, the Minccino took notice of Ari and rushed back into the room to hide under the bed.

"You have gotten a new one?" Ari asked, with the Buneary, which she remembered as being called 'Clumsy', sniffing her hand and tilting its head to the side. It didn't seem to fully remember her, but her scent appeared to be familiar.

"Yeah, I found Furball in some abandoned shack a few mounths ago. Poor thing was in very bad shape, and his fur had fallen. But now, he's gotten better."

"Nice…" After Clumsy let her pet it a little, Ari brought her hand to her stomach. "And about the food…"

"Oh, yes, of course!" Then they both went to the kitchen, and Ari tried to make a meal out of anything she could find. There was a sack of barbecue chips and a liter of soda that she took alongside a sandwich she crafted out of the limited content of the place.

Once she set down to eat, though, Ari noticed that Alice had not come along, preferring to play with her Pokémon instead. In fact, now that she looked closely, under those long, dark sleeves, it seemed as though the Goth's arm were quite skinny.

"You're not eating?" She asked, in an attempt to reassure herself.

"Oh, no. I'm not very hungry, I had a good breakfast." This response didn't really help with her worries, but Ari wasn't in condition to start an argument, so she decided to address the matter another time.

After she finished eating her dinner, Ari stretched and she and Alice decided to go into the latter's room, where the gothic blonde needed to calm her Minccino down due to Ari's presence.

The two girls settled on giving Ari the bed while Ari sat at her desk to draw. After some time, someone broke the silence reigning in the bedroom. However, it wasn't Ari, this time, but Alice.

"Ari?"

"Yeah?" Ari weakly mumbled, half asleep.

"In the hospital, I heard that the train crash wasn't an accident, that a suspect had even been apprehended." Ari let out a few grumblings, almost unconsciously and only half listening. "A few weird things have been happening lately, and there's a rumor of a group… What do you think it could mean?"

After Alice uttered these words, Ari finally seemed to come back into reality, as her face contorted in confusion.

"Uh… could you repeat that?"

"I… no, it doesn't matter. You can go back to sleep."

An hour later, Alice received a text from her frantic mother who had just learned of the incident. Except for this, Alice passed the rest of the afternoon with her hand resting on her chin, thinking back about this literal train wreck of a day, but ultimately grateful that she could get to see her friend again, despite the grim circumstances.


	4. Vero: The Peridot Ward

Day 1, 10:00

After departing from the Great Hall, Vero had decided to take place in the gardens that surrounded it in order to give his Charmender some much-needed training. After all, while he had fought well in his first two battles, it had been up against similar rookie Pokémon, and both trainer and Pokémon needed to sharpen their skills.

First, Vero had decided to teach Buddy to use the move Ember, like Victoria's Litten had. It was easy enough, since not only he had seen the move in action, but he could already kind of breathe fire, and he only needed to perform the task in a manner which weaponised the process. It took a good hour in order to get the attack right, but it would finally allow the Charmender to attack at a distance – Victoria could bring it, now!

Then, in order to put the odds on his side in as much situations as possible, Vero tried to teach Charmender the move Smoke Screen. Much like for Ember, it used abilities that Buddy already possessed, but it was slightly more complicated. In order to get the attack right, the Flame Pokémon had to insist on the part of the process of creating fire that created smoke, aka the burning of combustible. Creating a flame and spitting it out needed it as well, but in order to get a good Smoke Screen, a good chunk needed to burn down. That meant that Buddy couldn't perform the move too often before running dry of his combustible substance and he needed to recharge.

Vero figured that, with good training, his natural capabilities would increase in effectiveness and get rid of this inconvenience.

Buddy's physical training began with a little running around, nothing obnoxious to discourage him, but still some activity which was going to make him grow in speed and power. As much as Vero loathed the idea of relying on sheer might to win, it was undeniable that it was at least required to have some of it, or else you end up incapable of even damaging the opponent.

Fortunately, a young Pokémon's growth is generally very quick, and in a matter of hours, one can become almost twice as strong as they were before. After that, however, the progress will begin to feel slower and the power difference will be less evident as they continue to grow.

At noon, Vero decided that he had had enough and he decided to explore the city a little. He set his sights on the poor neighborhood that he had passed by earlier that day, just after the wreck, and he went off to its general direction, not without buying a sandwich at the Hall and getting a can for Buddy as well. At the same time, he stuffed his bag with as much Potions, Pokéballs, Antidotes, Anti-paras and Burn Heals he could buy. This, unfortunately, meant not a lot, maybe three or four of each, seeing as Vero's finances weren't exactly prosperous.

Thus, around the middle of the day, the young trainer truly went away on his journey, ready to make his own name as a Pokémon Master.

Now, one could be puzzled as to why Vero would choose the worst-looking area of the city in order to begin his travel, but the answer was quite simple. Vero, in his rookie mind, craved for battle and challenges, and he figured out that a place like the Peridot Ward was the perfect opportunity to get into a few Pokémon fights.

Sure enough, not long after he stepped in, some shady guy had already addressed him, and the two settled their differences in a battle. This time, however, Vero won quite easily. Unlike his two new rivals, Cain and Victoria, this guy was not a trainer of career, not even a beginner. His Pokémon, a low-level Pansage, was also a bit lackluster which, coupled with its weakness to fire, meant that the fight was a foregone conclusion. At least, Vero could now confirm that Buddy's Ember move was perfectly operational.

For the rest of the day, though, Vero couldn't seem to find a good opportunity for a Pokémon fight. Any person her would see were either busy or just… kind of standing there, looking at him with a scowl. At one point, though, as Vero walked by the railway, he remarked that a few houses were quite close to it. When the train was still in motion, it would no doubt cause a lot of inconvenience, if not outright safety hazards.

As he observed one of the buildings, he suddenly heard a voice booming from not too far.

"Hey, dude!" Vero's attention snapped to the guy. He was quite tall and bulky, with a dark leather vest, under which there was no sign of a shirt. "You are standing on the wrong side of the rail."

The boy then looked down at his feet, and he noticed that he was, indeed, walking on the same side as the guy's presumed property was. However, Vero wasn't going to let some asshole decide for him on what ground – public ground, mind you – he was going to step on or not.

"Listen, buddy." The other man's eye twitched a little at Vero's manner of addressing him. "You can ramble all you want, but I'm walking on whatever side I want, got it?" He tried to look tough, but Vero could feel his heartbeat accelerate and his muscles tense up.

The two men entered a standoff for a few seconds, until the other guy grinned and lifted his chin.

"You… you're one of these little bitches from the Gyms or whatever who think they can just come in and do whatever they want, right?" His smirk devolved into a disdainful scowl. "Well, lemme tell you something, you ain't shit here. If you talk to me like that again, you little bitch, I'm making sure your day ends up with my boot up your ass. _Got it?_"

Now, Vero had adopted a scowl of his own. While he wasn't fearless, he was not going to let some low-life, crude loser talk to him with such flagrant disrespect. He sighed, then raised his hand with a mock smile.

"Alright, then, let's do something: Pokémon battle, right here and now, and if you win, I get on the other side. If _I_ win, however, I do what the hell I want."

The local then nodded slowly, before grinning again.

"All right, boy. Show me ya moves."

The two then settled on the ground between the rail and the apartment building, Vero at north, the other guy at south. A few passing people had been made aware of the incoming fight and had come to witness it from afar. Vero let out his Charmender, all ready to battle and eager to go, while the older man snickered.

"Ha, you think you're hot, but you're just a rookie, are ya?"

Vero ignored the creeping feeling of regret that had been fading in until now, and tensed up. Then, the man got his own Pokémon out.

"All right, come on, Bro-Barel!" Then, after the Pokéball opened, a bulky Bibarel appeared.

The young trainer's eyes narrowed a little at this, realising now that he may just have made a mistake.

"_Water-type, shit!"_

The man crossed his arms and Vero entered a generic battle stance. Then, the two opponents began shouting their orders.

"Bro-Barel, Protect!"

"Buddy, Smoke Screen!"

The older man could only mumble a confused 'huh?' at Vero's decision. While Vero thought it was a decent enough call to cast Protect, it seemed that this guy didn't have a sharp mind for battling. Standard brawn at the detriment of brains.

Buddy's attack covered the opposing Pokémon in a thick layer of smoke, which left it coughing and covering its eyes.

"Come on, now, you idiot! Shake it off!" Came the other trainer's orders, much to Vero's amusement. He took this opportunity to continue the pressure.

"Growl, then Scratch!"

After the Charmender's Growl had left the Bibarel weakened, he took chase and hit him with his claws. Vero then smirked in satisfaction, seeing the opposing Pokémon falling backwards. _"Who's the little bitch, now?"_ He couldn't help thinking.

However, Bro-Barel was far from done. When it stood back up, it looked almost as furious as its master. It slammed its enormous tail on the ground, with such force that it created a shockwave.

"_Wait, wasn't it weakened?"_ Vero thought. The beaver Pokémon then chased after Buddy, but it was slower than before, funnily enough. That's when Vero's eyes widened in realisation.

"It has Moody!" He exclaimed, with the other man now sporting a cocky look. Now, Vero thought, the best strategy would be to try to defeat it as quickly as possible, before it became a figurative steamroller. But first…

"Buddy, Ember, multiple times!"

The little lizard then jumped and fired its attack as ordered, the Bibarel standing and taking it head-on. After the fourth time it hit, however, Bro-Barel winced in pain.

"Hey, what's the matter, man?" Asked one of the spectators, concerned by the turn of events.

"He's burned." Vero stated with a frown. "Now, let's do this, Smoke Screen! As much as you can!"

Vero's foe grimaced in rage as Charmender covered the field in a thick dark substance, which even got to both trainers. Vero thought about this and brought his shirt to his mouth to offer it some kind of protection. He could hear Bro-Barel wailing around, trying to get some kind of hit on Buddy. Then, once the smoke settled, the enemy Bibarel was already almost down, due to the burn. A Scratch attack later, and Vero had won the battle, with Buddy not even hit once. Even Cain's Nidoran had managed to at least clash with him.

"Now, the guy from the 'gyms or whatever' will walk where damn well he wants." Vero claimed. However, his defeated opponent only looked at him with pure rage, before beginning to rant.

"Coward! You just waited until my boy was weak and you picked him then!"

"Just like you were waiting for your Bibarel to become virtually invulnerable and steamroll me?" Came Vero's response, only further angering the guy.

Before long, Vero noticed with dread that around four or five people had come along, most of them with angry look into their eyes.

"You… you think you can just come and get all you want from us, huh!" Continued the madman, behind. The several thugs were placed in a way that forced Vero to step back towards a building.

At this moment, Vero tried to stand his ground.

"Y-you guys better back off, you got me? I've won fair and square…" He tried to say, but one of the men was now going to slam him to the wall.

"And what the fuck do you think it does for me? You think I play by your stupid rules?" The defeated trainer said, before his goon pushed Vero on the wall, making him fall on his backside. Buddy, who hadn't been recalled yet, hissed in warning to the several men present, but his intimidation tactic was obviously not working. He could probably beat a normal human being alone, but the Charmender feared that he couldn't defeat all five ganging on him with their respective Pokémon.

At this moment, Vero wanted to make a snide remark, something about cowardice and lack of guts that would wound these idiots right into their sense of self-worth. However, surrounded by men who all towered above him, probably with Pokémon of their own, he could only gulp in fear and stay still, while he tried to figure out a way to get his ass out of this mess.

Then, one of the thugs tried to take a grab on Vero's bag, which granted him a nasty bite from his angered Charmender. After the man screamed in pain as his fellows snickered at his infortune, he came back and went for a kick to the Pokémon, which the little Pokémon dodged as his trainer kicked him in the leg.

During this time, however, another had managed to take hold of his possessions and he looked through it with disgust as he realised that there was not anything worth re-selling. The cornered trainer and his Pokémon tried to get it back, but all Vero got for his troubles was a punch to the face, which sent him back on the ground.

At this moment, however, a powerful sonic blast ran straight through the group, causing them to bring their hands to their ears in surprise. They then turned back to look at their attacker; a little Noibat, clumsily flying around and coming back to its trainer.

It was a young dark-skinned woman, with pitch-black hair which was tied in an enormous ponytail and ran long and wide down her back, with the rest poking forward and partly obscuring her right eye. She wore an elegant white coat and black shorts. Under the latter, were thin leggings which went down to her boots, which were also black, but with a bit of white fur on the top. Her visage was quite sharp, with a pointy nose and big, piercing and purple-ish eyes.

Upon close observation, one could see that she didn't look any bit confident about her intervention, but she stood her ground nonetheless, looking at the injured boy the group was assaulting.

Vero, holding his own bleeding nose, took a look at her as well and, taking the opportunity provided by their attention being directed to her, ordered his Charmender to use Smoke Screen once again and then ran for his life, taking his little partner with him. Following his example, the girl ran for it as well, with the thugs not following them. They were satisfied at having taught Vero his lesson.

After they were sure that the scene of events was out of sight, both Vero and the young woman eventually stopped, with Vero bringing his hand back to his nose, realising it was still bleeding heavily. The girl then offered him a piece of tissue, which Vero more than happily accepted. After the adrenaline had died down in both of them, the young man sat down against a wall and sighed, trying his best to keep his composure in front of the girl.

The latter then kneed down to him and stayed there, trying to make sure that the guy was going to be alright. She eventually began talking to him.

"You… you're okay? You look pretty messed up."

"_No shit…"_ He thought bitterly, but he didn't have the heart for that at the moment. "No, it's just a single punch, I've been through worse…"

Like a train wreck the very same morning, which bizarrely had left him less emotionally affected than a group of petty criminals.

The two then got up and she offered him to go to the hospital, which he refused. He didn't need to, he thought, and his pride had already been wounded enough as it was.

"In any case, just try to stay clear of trouble, alright?" Said the girl, causing Vero to look down and sigh. She then gave her hand, before adding. "The name is Lucia, by the way. What about you?" Vero then took her hand and shook it.

"Vero." His response was short, since with the stress inside of him now gone, he felt more tired than anything. The two trainers then stayed still in front of each other for a few uncomfortable seconds before Vero got fed up of it.

"So, I think we will meet again, someday?" He said, with a face that screamed 'Why did I leave bed this morning'.

"Yes, I guess… Just be careful not to dig yourself into trouble again, will you?"

After some mumblings of agreement – or annoyance, it's still up in the air to this day – from Vero, Lucia proceeded to quit the scene and he noticed that she was heading towards the Great Hall.

Looking down on Buddy, who had been glued to his leg for the entire conversation, Vero sighed.

"Okay, now I think would be a good time to find somewhere to sleep tonight, what do you think?" Buddy didn't seem to understand, but he looked happy enough to be talked to.

However, when Vero instinctively reached for his Pokéball in order to recall his Pokémon, he realised something quite troublesome: He had left his bag to the gang.

Fortunately, Vero's Pokéballs (or at least six of them) were kept in a small banana bag that he kept around his waist, but otherwise all of his possessions were lost.

"_Honestly, I don't think this day could become any worse"_ Vero thought. Had he tried to dare the universe to run over him even more, he couldn't have chosen better words. He then began to search for some place to sleep to for the night. After all, if trainers were coming en masse, there must be ways implemented to welcome them, right?

Right?


	5. Kuro: The local nerd and the top dog

Day 1, 15:30

Florinia, the grass-type Gym leader, was continuing her lecture in the sandy arena that she used for her official battles, as she commented on the demonstration fight that had been disputed just before.

One of the trainers, a female student, kept her head low while holding her defeated Ducklett in her arms. She listened to Florinia, but she mostly looked bitterly at the boy who had beaten her.

The young trainer stood there with a smug face, eyes closed and not even bothering to look at his victorious Budew. He was of fairly average height, and if he could be described physically in one word, it would be _green_. His shirt, its long collar, his shorts, his eyes, his spiky hair, his slightly tainted glasses, _everything_, except for the necklace he wore around his neck, which had some teeth decorating it.

During this time, at the back of the arena's stands, was waiting another young man. He yawned from the sheer boredom he was feeling. Florinia was very knowledgeable, and she knew what she was talking about, but she was so _damn soporific_! After his act, the trainer-in-training needed to readjust his glasses a bit, and he looked over to his partner Pokémon, a Froakie, who was currently sleeping next to him. If only he could do the same without being reprimanded.

The young man was named Kuro, the local nerd. His brown skin and eyes were the closest thing you could call colorful in his entire appearance, with his long hair and jacket being white while his undershirt and pants were black.

Before he knew it, however, the class had already finished, and everyone jumped out of their seat in order to get some fresh air outside. Kuro didn't really share the rest of the students' excitement. He came from Spinel Town, in the east of the region, and he knew what fresh air was like, and it was surely not like this pestilence brought by the various industries of the capital. Instead, he petted his Froakie, called Jet, which awakened the little Pokémon. He then slowly got up and left to the dorms with the same low speed.

Really, what was he even doing in this school? All he did was review everything he had already learned before, except that since there were people who came here completely ignorant about Pokémon, battling, or field effects, he found himself passing his days doing _nothing_ and learning somehow even less. The only good parts of the day were the training sessions where he could get apart from the others and teach some things to his Froakie. He only had Jet for a few days, but the little guy was doing very well. His Protean ability didn't hurt either.

Last, but not least of his daily plagues, though, was the guy who everyone seemed to love and hate at the same time, but to whom never really did anything. The very same who had smugly stood in the arena a minute before.

Fern.

Kuro wasn't a bad trainer by any means. He was perfectly able to hold his own against anyone with similar experience to his own. However, even he couldn't defeat this jerk, who had his Pokémon since the beginning of the semester – which, to be fair, was only three weeks ago – and had years of experience in battling.

Fortunately, Kuro was of low enough profile so that the jerk mostly left him alone. At least, until now.

He went to the cafeteria and browsed on his Pokégear while waiting for the counters to start giving out meals. He didn't intend on waiting for an hour for idiots who couldn't decide on the flavor of their cake slice or the stuffing of their pizza.

As he stood there, alone, he was so busy checking about the news of an attack at the Reborn train station that he missed the guy walking up to him. Once he did, he was already to him. A familiar green silhouette was coming, this time without his usual group of cronies, and began talking to Kuro.

"Hey, there, silent guy. What're you doing up here alone?"

Kuro barely bothered to lift his gaze to meet Fern's, immediately recognising his arrogant, punch-inviting grin. He then looked back to his device, not answering.

"Hey, I asked you a question, you think you can just ignore me?"

Fern then proceeded to wave his hand in front of Kuro's face, causing the latter to frown in annoyance, before he answered to neither of his questions.

"If you want me to further inflate your ego, then I can tell you did a decent job back at the demo. Now, if you will, I was very busy not being bothered before you came."

"Aaw, boo-hoo. Won't you even try to have some kind of social interaction, or are you just as much a loser in interacting as in battling?"

Kuro stopped scrolling for a second, and Fern knew he took the bait already.

"I guess that explains why you never want to train with my guys. Although, from your expression, I deduce you would like to try out some true fighting, am I right?"

Kuro let out a sigh. What the jerk in front of him had said wasn't entirely _untrue_, but although he wanted to test his skills, everyone in this school was either way above his level, like the teachers, devoid of any outstanding talent, or just assholes, like Fern. He was seriously considering to try to join a party of trainers the first chance he gets.

"Maybe, but not now, and certainly not against _you_." Kuro hoped that he would be able to get some relative peace, but as he feared, Fern was persistent.

"What? Too scared to face me?" The brown-skinned young man tried his best not to react at this, but it wasn't that easy. The guy was simply infuriating.

"No, I just want to get my food without you being there to harass me."

"Oh, don't worry, by the time I'm done with you, it won't have even begun yet, trust me."

As Fern said this, a few other students, including a few of the green jerk's boot-licking squad, had gathered around in curiosity or in the case there would be a new guy to laugh at. At this point, Kuro knew there was no going out of this mess, and if he had to choose between loosing face while either running or fighting, then he figured he could as well pick the fighting.

"Alright, you win. Let's just get this over with, Plant."

A few chuckles emerged from the crowd surrounding them in reaction to the new nickname, much to Fern's ire and Kuro's delight. Once the two trainers arrived to the indoors arenas, the two opponents went on opposite sides and brought out their selected fighter. Kuro only had his Froakie, so that's who he came up with, while Fern chose his own starter: a Rowlet. Fern stroke a battle pose while Kuro nonchalantly brought his hands in his pockets.

"Ready to face the guy on the top, loser?"

"I don't swing this way, but yeah, I am."

"Joke all you want, it won't save you from-"

Then, in the middle of Fern's sentence, his opponent whistled, loudly. He did it two times, in fact, as if to call over to him like a vulgar canine or something.

"Hey, don't you…"

He was cut short when Froakie slammed right into Rowlet, having executed Quick Attack, without any apparent order to do so. He deduced that Kuro was mocking him so his Pokémon could sneak a hit in as a part of his strategy. Fern frowned and retaliated.

"Okay, use Tackle!"

Rowlet had essentially shrugged off the previous hit it endured, thanks to its training, and it went flying straight for the opposing Froakie. However, Kuro whistled another time and Rowlet did something really, really weird.

It went _right through Froakie!_

Right after this, it attacked Rowlet with its tongue, and Fern actually understood what Kuro was doing. He used his whistling as commands in order to hide his intentions from him, in this instance using Lick to turn into a ghost-type with his Protean ability. Pretty smart, Fern admitted, but it was merely a trick compared to his sheer skill.

Now that Fern was aware of his strategy, Kuro knew it was only a matter of time before he went down, but he was still going to annoy the hell out of him as long as he could.

When Plant ordered his Rowlet to use another Razor Leaf, Kuro had Jet use a move that he shouldn't know at this point of his growth: Bound. Only through very specific tutelage – and the help of a move tutor in the Onyx Ward – had he done it. Jet leaped towards the roof and slammed right into the pretentious boy's partner, landing a Super Effective hit.

However, now Fern had his Pokémon use Peck, chasing after the Froakie frenetically. Kuro wasn't able to build up a reliable long-term strategy, now that his foe didn't leave him room to breathe anymore, and he couldn't escape the attack by adopting an immunity to it, like he could with Tackle.

However, Jet was still able to land a Pound or Lick attack here and there, but with the difference in level of the two Pokémon, Rowlet eventually managed to land a strike which ended the match for good. However, despite his loss, Kuro was sporting a smug smirk.

The crowd around had been cheering on both fighters, some even openly rooted for him. Furthermore, the frustration that Kuro had managed to pump out of Plant had all but ruined the fun he could have had mocking him for his defeat. Finally, he would probably not want to fight him anymore, in order to save himself the trouble.

Just before Kuro departed, though, the headmaster of the school, Florinia, came in. He thought she was going to lecture them for some reason, but she only wanted to talk to Fern. The arrogant young man shrugged and went with her, as the crowd dispersed.

This evening, Kuro went to sleep pretty satisfied with himself, more than he did for the last few weeks, at least.


	6. Vero: Rough first day

Day 1, 19:45

Vero had managed to find some lousy motel which he could use, short of anything better. Once he came in, however, the place was pitch-black, but the young man could still faintly see a receptionist through the light made by the opened door. What was she doing there? He didn't know, and he did not really care. He went to where the counter was, helped by the faint glow given by Buddy's flaming tail.

"Hello, miss?" He called. "Could you tell me if there is a room I could sleep in tonight?"

"There isn't, we can't let people rent rooms until our current comes back." Came the woman's dry response.

"Well, I don't care about the light, I just want to sleep somewhere." It took Vero all of his inner strength to stay calm with his extremely limited reserves of patience.

"Listen, bud, our rooms open with little magnetic cards, so we're not gonna force them open just for you, alright?"

If any coloring was visible at that moment, the woman could have seen Vero's red face, ready to burst at any moment.

However, before he could lose his temper, a gigantic spark appeared from one of the corners of the room, startling both trainer and receptionist. Vero looked and, in the faint orange glow provided by Buddy, he could see some movement coming from there. Looking closer, the moving… _thing_ was quite small, but when the young man approached it, a shot of a… sticky stuff went straight at him, with Vero being barely able to dodge.

A little Pokémon, using a spider web, who messed with electricity? Of course, Vero thought, it could only be a Joltik!

Searching for the damn thing in the almost complete darkness, Vero ordered his Charmender to use Scratch on sight, and when the diminutive Pokémon attacked again, Buddy was ready and, after a clear hit, pinned it on the ground. Vero then grabbed one of his last remaining Pokéballs before throwing it in the direction of the two, while the receptionist hid behind her counter in order to avoid being hit by accident by an attack.

The Ball opened and trapped the Joltik inside, but seeing it shake violently, Vero knew it wouldn't be enough. Sure enough, it escaped and retaliated with Thunder Wave, landing its attack right on Buddy. The Joltik tried to escape, but Vero quickly prepared another Ball and tried to catch it again. This time, the shaking was less violent, and after turning around three times, with the button glowing red, it stabilised itself and glowed green, indicating that the capture had been successful! At least, something good came out of this horrible afternoon.

Breathing heavily and puffing up his chest in reaction to his very first captured Pokémon, Vero smirked before going to the counter, where the woman had peeked her head up.

"Alright, I've caught your troublemaker, shouldn't be any more problem now." However, in the darkness, he didn't quite discern the look of sorry from the receptionist.

"I'm… thank you a lot, bud…" She at least sounded way more sympathetic than when Vero entered the place, although he guessed that she may not have had a very good day herself. "…But I still can't do anything for you. Now, I'll have to call someone to fix the mess."

Vero gave out a defeated sigh, letting his head fall loudly on the counter. This resulted in an unnecessary noise and a slight pain on his forehead. He then looked at his Charmender, who was still paralysed due to the Thunder Wave. "Do you at least have some Pokémon meds to share?" She nodded.

"Yeah, sure."

After healing both his partner and his new catch, Vero went outside, where the sun had already set, and Vero was getting more and more tired. No other place to sleep was in sight, and all he wanted was to find a god damned place where he could sleep. Worst of all, dark clouds had gathered in the sky and it had begun to rain, forcing Vero to call his starter back.

After wandering around for a few minutes, Vero set his sights on a seemingly empty alley, where there was a trash can under a quickly-made roof made of metal sheets, in which he could light a fire with Buddy's help if he needed it. Going in and sitting alongside the wall, he released both his Pokémon and let them relax near the can. Tomorrow, he would work a bit with his Joltik, which he had decided to name Sparky, in order to see what kind of power it held and what moves it could do.

After starting a small fire to feel warmer in the freshness of the nightly rain, he had just begun to finally decompress when he heard some footsteps, making him jump and his Charmender growl. The 'intruder' was a rather poorly-dressed and fully bearded man, who had a damaged umbrella to protect him, which didn't seem to fully work since parts of him were pretty wet.

The man lifted his hands to try to assure Vero that he wasn't a threat and the boy then asked his Pokémon to come by his side, trying not to think about what the guy could try to do.

The man then sat a little afar from Vero before examining him.

"It's not every day that I have a visitor that isn't stoned out of his mind." He said, attracting Vero's attention back. "What happened to you?"

The young man wondered what he was on about for a second, until he looked down and noticed that his white shirt had been drenched in his blood because of his nose earlier. On top of this, the only replacement was now the property of some thugs.

"Hey, you have an idea where I could fill a complaint of thief?" Vero said, ignoring the man's first question, yet answering it at the same time.

"Right now, with their limited numbers and the ruckus with the train, I doubt that would be of much help to you, boy. I'm sorry." He then looked at the young man once again. "You're new to this city, right?" A nod from Vero sufficed. "Well, then, let me tell ya something: don't give up."

"Huh?" It was all that Vero could say while petting his sleepy Charmender.

"Ten years ago, I was a pretty high executive in Yureyu." Vero gave him a questioning stare. "It was a pretty big company, at the time. When the earthquakes began striking, it destroyed its headquarters and I found myself without a job. I gave up, and look at me now. No more marriage, no kids and no future…"

Vero asked himself whether the man was talking to him or to himself.

"But you, you can go on. Never give up, never end up like…" He didn't finish, but Vero nodded in response. As his roommate of fortune lowered his head and closed his eyes, Vero wondered how many of the guys earlier this afternoon were like him; unlucky men who had no other way of living now. It didn't stop his desire to get back at them for the humiliation they gave him, but he couldn't help but feel sorry for the people of this Ward.

With Buddy in his right arm and Sparky on his left shoulder, Vero finally let the strain of the day kick in and put him to sleep to the reassuring, monotonous sound of the raging rain.


	7. Vero: First impressions

Day 2, 5:45

The next morning, Vero woke up, noticing that the man who had come the previous day was now gone. He gently removed his newly caught Joltik from his shoulder and then he stretched slightly, feeling refreshed after the good sleep he had.

He then recalled both his Pokémon in order to avoid attracting unneeded attention and went further north to continue to explore the Ward, but this time he made the vow to avoid getting in trouble like the day before. Eventually, he found a Pokémart, where he was at least able to buy some Pokésnax (enough for a few days) and a cheap bag to store them. At least, he would be able to provide food to his Pokémon.

Right after his purchases were done, he asked for the cashier where would be the nearest park. When he followed his directions, he was… kind of disappointed. In truth, it was less of a park and more of an alley with a swing and a few flowers in it, but Vero guessed that this was as good as some people got.

There, he released his two partners, Buddy and Sparky. He had his Charmender doing some jogging around while he tried to get his Joltik to show him the moves it knew. Now that he thought about it, he didn't know if it was a male or female, with his Pokédex stolen and no easy way to tell the gender of a little bug. When he ordered it to attack a rock he had found lying around, Sparky glued it up with String Shot. When he told it to use something else, the little Pokémon simply looked at him, unmoving.

Vero sighed. Normally, a well-trained Pokémon, like a starter of his brother's, was able to easily understand a human. Even wild ones, for the most part, were able to somewhat get what their trainer were saying. Either this Joltik was on the lower end of his species' IQ, or it was young. In the latter case – Vero hoped it was – only time was needed to remedy to the problem. He then tried to remember what kind of moves a young Joltik typically knew, and he told Sparky to try to use them.

Since he already knew for String Shot and Thunder Wave, at least, he only had two moves to find out. First, he told Sparky to attack the rock directly, which seemed simple enough for it to understand. It then proceeded to jump at the target and to strike it with its front legs, from which pale green energy erupted in the form of a pair of pointy blades. Then, it stroke again, and again, until a visible fissure appeared on the rock. At this point, Vero deduced that this attack was probably Fury Cutter, since it had been increasing in power at each hit.

After this, Vero told Sparky to attack from afar, and it then simply glowed green, with no effect on the target. Puzzled, Vero decided that he would test it out in battle later. After this, Vero passed a good hour strengthening and sharpening Sparky's power, speed and reflexes, and he was pleased to see that the little guy was already kind of good at jumping in zigzag.

At this point, Vero called Buddy and then took the two Pokémon on a little walk. Well, to be more precise, the Charmender walked while the Joltik comfortably settled on its trainer's shoulder. He was beginning to feel a bit stuck between the alley's walls, and he wanted to make some kind of exercise himself.

On his walk, he went a bit at west, following the polluted lake's edge, until he stumbled across a gigantic building. It looked like it was industrial, but it seemed to be in a pretty pitiful shape, and there was no activity near it whatsoever, except for an old lady who was contemplating the view – what a view, he thought sarcastically – and some other person, dressed and haired in all green, who was examining the main entrance. Vero simply thought that they were trying to explore its empty indoors in search of anything valuable, until he approached them.

"Damnit, she said that it was supposed to be the factory, didn't she..?" They seemed to think for a second until their face lit up with an expression of annoyance. "Oh, of course, she meant the _other_ one, could have told me… or did she?"

At this point, he noticed Vero, who was observing him back, with his Charmender and Joltik in plain view. The green-dressed fellow then sent him what was probably meant as a cold stare, but only came off as trying too hard to look tough.

"What are you looking at, like that? You want something?" At his voice, Vero determined that it was a guy, although his attire didn't give this away instantly, especially when seen from behind.

"No, I just wondered what you were doing, mumbling to yourself." He replied, shrugging his shoulders. Since the other man seemed to be a trainer like himself, Vero figured it wasn't as risky to talk back with him as with the gang leader the previous day.

"Evidently, you've no idea of who you're dealing with, here." The green guy then stroke a pose, separating his legs a little, putting his right hand on his chest, the other on his hip, while placing his head sideways. "I'm Fern, and _I_ am the top dog, the cool cat, the coolest monkey in the jungle, you get what I'm saying?" Vero simply sighed before Fern continued. "By the way, have you seen the two gym leaders, Florinia and Julia?"

"I know Julia, but I haven't seen them around since the train incident. Why? You want to challenge them?" Fern snorted.

"No, I have business to do with them." He looked back at the industry behind him. "They say they have intelligence on where the perpetrator of the train attack operated, and they told me it was at 'the big factory in Peridot Ward'." As Fern spoke, Vero's eyes lit up a little.

"They know where this asshole was?"

"Why do you ask?" Came the green man's derisive response.

Strangely, when Vero heard of the terrorist, he got an urge to go and bash their skull in himself. Unlike with the gang, who were merely unlucky people with a less-than-good way of dealing with it and who responded to him provoking them first, this guy had straight-up murdered a good chunk of innocent passengers, almost including him, this Ari girl, and the League manager.

"Well, let's just say I have to get even with him. You need help for that?" Fern then adopted a look of confusion and amusement before bringing his hand to his chin and smirking.

"Heh, why not? But on one condition: you have to prove to me that you are worthy. After all, I can't let some loser getting himself killed for nothing, especially if I can help it…" On paper, these words sounded almost compassionate, but with the grin he had, Vero guessed that the guy was already thinking he would win easily. "Alright, let's do a battle, then if you prove yourself good, we'll go to the other factory together, okay?"

"Good. Count on me."

The two then agreed to use the parking lot of the factory as a battlefield, since there weren't any car anymore in the city and the building was abandoned anyway. Once again, the terrain was rather neutral, though the ground was way harder, being made of concrete and all.

"Alright, so which one of your two Pokémon you'll send? Unless you have another one?" Fern asked, looking rather relaxed.

"I'm calling them both back, and we'll send our chosen fighter both at the same time, what about that?" After all, he wasn't going to let his opponent chose his Pokémon in light of his own.

"Fair enough."

Once he was ready to throw his Pokémon out in battle, he nodded at Fern, who nodded himself. Then, both trainers sent out their chosen fighter. From Vero's side came Buddy, stomping his foot aggressively on the ground, while Fern had sent out a Budew. A weird choice, Vero thought, since his foe had seen that he had two Pokémon who could handle themselves well against it.

"Buddy, use Smoke Screen!"

"Budew, Water Sport."

Oh, so that was his plan.

Although Buddy's move had the effects intended, his Ember attack would still be less effective, negating the type advantage Vero benefited from. However, Vero know that Budew couldn't do much against him, especially if he was on the lookout for the spore attacks that grass-types are known for. Sure enough…

"Now, use Stun Spore!"

Fern smirked as his Pokémon began to shake, before Vero did something he didn't expect.

"Jump backwards, Buddy, and use Ember!"

From the Budew's perspective, the shadows around it were suddenly lighted up by a burning orange glow as the attacks went straight to it. Since it wasn't exactly a fast Pokémon, it couldn't dodge in time and was sent pretty far away. It got up with difficulty, before Vero ordered another Ember, which knocked it out.

"Well, I guess it happens. Didn't think you would keep using a weakened move, but whatever…" Said Fern, returning his downed Pokémon with an expression of disappointment on his face. He then waited a little for Smoke Screen to completely wither away, before he sent out his next Pokémon.

"Alright, Sandile, you got this."

After he spoke those words, the little Desert Croc Pokémon came out of his Pokéball and, bearing its fangs, it was ready to battle with the Charmender opposing it. Vero tensed himself up a little. Unlike the slow, type-disadvantaged Budew, this one was probably more vicious. On top of it, its ground had the upper hand against Buddy's fire.

Vero decided to act first.

"Buddy, Smoke Screen again!"

Charmender then immediately began to spit out as many smoke as it could, while Fern stayed still except for a slight shaking of his head.

"Sand Tomb."

"Buddy, dodge it!"

However, it was too late. The opposite Sandile's attack had quickly settled itself around Buddy, blinding him with sand and dispersing the Smoke Screen with the whirlwind it created as a side-effect. He then let out a light chuckle before Vero tried to counterattack.

"Okay, don't worry… Use Scratch! Run after it!"

"Bite!"

The Sandile and Charmender then rushed at each other, one with its fangs in the open and the other with his claws. When they met in the middle of the battlefield, Sandile easily caught Buddy's attack in its jaw, before it tried to jerk him away. However, although Sandile had the advantage, the Charmender was a bit stronger than expected, and he managed to stand his ground until came Vero's next order, taking a page from Cain's book.

"Now, Growl!"

Buddy's Growl attack, accompanied by a 'shit' from Fern, allowed Buddy to gain the upper hand in close quarters. Once he could get the little crocodile off his claws, he stroke it with his Scratch move. He then threw an Ember to the projected Sandile, who barely avoided the attack. Fern frowned, not liking the turn this battle was taking.

He ordered his Pokémon to use torment, and then Sand Tomb, before it could go after Buddy. Already weakened by the two Sand Tombs and the first Bite he had to endure, the second Bite was a bit too much for him to keep going. As he laid defeated, Vero took him back in his Pokéball before he prepared Sparky's. Once the Joltik had been released, the match was on once again.

Fern made his Sandile use Sand Tomb once again, but Vero decided to make good use of the Pokémon's diminutive size and made it side jump the move.

"Now, use String Shot!"

The Sandile, still focused on its Sand Tomb, couldn't react fast enough to avoid all of the sticky fluid that went all over it and found itself stuck in place as it tried to free itself. However, with its reduced strength due to Growl, it couldn't do the deed before Sparky's Fury Cutter knocked it down.

Vero breathed deeply with pride at seeing his first captured Pokémon win its very first match. Granted, it was an already damaged and weakened opponent, but it was a victory nonetheless.

"Alright, now will y-"

"Nope. I'm not done yet, loser…"

Vero took a second to process what his foe had just said, before the latter sent out a Rowlet – presumably his own starter. After he realised the implications, Vero protested.

"Hey, that's not fair! I have only two Pokémon! It's over!"

"We never said it was two-on-two. It's a full-blown battle, and we're using everything we have. Thus, face my last one or forfeit, beginner."

Resisting his urge to punch Fern in the face, he begrudgingly nodded and took a deep breath. Even though he was going to continue the match, even if only to conserve what little dignity he had left, he wasn't sure if it was good for Sparky. After all, it had never battled before, and his opponent could _fly_.

Still, the match continued once both trainers were ready. Now, though, Vero realised that all relaxation had left Fern's body, a livid seriousness taking its place.

"Go up and use Razor Leaf."

The Rowlet then went flying up in the air and obeyed its master. Vero cursed under his breath, as he told Sparky to counter the leaves with Fury Cutter. Fortunately, the attack was more effective each time it hit. Unfortunately, with its opponent in the air, Vero doubted it would be relevant.

When Fern had his Rowlet come back closer to the ground to use Peck, seeing as Razor Leaf wasn't going to suffice, Vero had an idea.

"Sparky, jump on it!"

Both Fern and Rowlet were surprised as the little Joltik sprung right into the bird's face, hanging tightly on it as the panicked grass-type tried to slam itself to the ground in order to get rid of it. Although it _did_ manage to hurt Sparky once, the little bug held on and, once given some room to breathe, took a decision of its own and used Thunder Wave at point-blank range before letting go of the Rowlet's face.

Indeed, while Vero was worried that Sparky didn't have the needed experience to face Fern's presumed strongest fighter, he failed to take into account that it was still a wild Pokémon prior to its capture. It had to fend off by itself to survive. As a result, unlike a groomed starter, the newly caught Joltik already knew its fair share about fighting even before its training, and thus could trade blows with a Pokémon that was being trained since weeks evenly.

The bird then crashed into the concrete face-first, while the Joltik, too small to get much falling velocity, landed safely. Vero then snapped out of his awe and shouted.

"Now, use String Shot!"

As Fern let out a groan of frustration, his Pokémon was glued to the ground while being paralysed, and thus it was at the complete mercy of Sparky. One of the cutest, most non menacing-looking Pokémon, who would have thought?

"Now, finish it off with Fury Cutter!"

"Razor Leaf!"

"_Oh, crap!"_ Vero thought, as his little Pokémon was hit directly by the attack because of his carelessness. However, considering Sparky's part bug-type, the move didn't damage it that much, and it could still go to the downed Rowlet and deal the finishing blow, ending the match swiftly.

As both of them recalled their Pokémon, Vero sighed in relief. After Buddy had been defeated, he really thought it was game over. He came over to Fern in order to offer a handshake in good spirit.

"Wow, I really thought you had me there, you are pretty good…" However, Fern didn't react as Vero expected and turned away in contempt.

"Of course I am, what did you think?" He then looked back to Vero and looked at him with disgust. "You only won because of type advantage and dumb luck."

Mentally, Vero called bullshit on his excuses. Both of them had had the type advantage at some point in the battle, and Fern even used one more Pokémon than he did. What Sparky had pulled hadn't been his decision, but it wasn't dumb luck either; it was just the little bug proving its worth.

"Yeah, whatever." Vero said, abandoning his shake pose. "Now, let's get to the factory, yes?"

"I guess we will. First, though, let's go heal our Pokémon, we'll need them."

Vero agreed and left the scene with his new acquaintance.

After the two of them had made a detour by the Pokémon Center of Peridot, they went directly to the other abandoned factory that Fern had talked about and, sure enough, Julia was there, waiting with another woman, who was also dressed in green. Upon seeing her, Vero had to blink twice to make sure he wasn't hallucinating; the resemblance with Fern was pretty uncanny.

As Vero expected, Julia greeted them with excitement, jumping on place and waving both of her hands in a cheerleader-like fashion. Her companion, on the other, merely adjusted her glasses and looked passively at Vero. He couldn't help but slightly shiver at the coldness of her stare.

"Hey! Fern! Finally, you're here and – *gasp* – Vero is here too! No complaint here, after all, beating bad guys is WAY funnier when-"

"Who is this individual, brother?" Julia could only stand in place, frozen in her interrupted dance of joy, when Florinia cut her in order to question Fern.

"Just some random tag-along who wanted to kick some ass, so I brought him over."

"_After practically cheating so you wouldn't have to."_ Vero thought. "Yeah, I figured I could provide some help."

"…" The green-dressed woman considered the option for a little while, before stating. "If you take full responsibility for the risks you run while assisting us on this assignment, then we shall accept your assistance."

"Yeah, that's Florinia." Fern said, with a smirk as he addressed Vero. "But everyone calls her 'The Flobot' because, you know, she speaks like a robot." His addressee couldn't help but smiling at the nickname.

"Well, I don't, 'cause Fifi is not a robot, am I right?" The over-energetic woman looked at her friend, who nodded in her direction.

"That is correct. Now, we have a cleaning operation to do. Julia, you may use your pyrotechnics to open a path."

Just as Vero began to wonder what Florinia was talking about, Julia sent out an Electrode, which sent itself hurling towards the metal door of the smaller factory.

_BOOOM!_

Without any kind of warning, except for Florinia's order, Vero didn't brace himself and was sent to the ground by the shockwave created by the Electrode's Explosion attack. As he got up, slightly embarrassed, he noticed Fern's amused expression – though he couldn't really blame him for it.

Before the four trainers entered the building, the green boy spoke to the dark jacket-wearing one.

"Hey, dude… what was your name, again?"

"Vero."

"Yeah, Vero, whatever… I know we've not really started on the best of terms, but since we're gonna fight together, I think it would be good to restart anew, what do you think?"

Vero looked at his interlocutor for a second. Apart from his disinterested expression, he seemed quite genuine.

"Okay, I guess that's good."

He then offered his hand to Fern, who shook it, this time, but with a small look of contempt on his face.

"Now, let's kick some bad guy butt."

"On it!" Vero exclaimed, calling both his Pokémon to his side as the green boy did the same.


	8. Vero: Meteor strike

***Alright, so I know that it is the third consecutive chapter about Vero, but it will be the last one for a little while, I promise. It's soon the others' time to shine***

Day 2, 11:00

As the four assailants entered into the main hall of the factory, Florinia observed her surroundings with disconcerting accuracy and speed. It's just a shame that there was not much worth using these deduction skills on.

"According to the observations I have operated, there are two different main compartments in this base. Fern, Vero, you will enter by the door at your left. Julia and I shall thus take the right. Be careful, the individuals who worked alongside the terrorist have undoubtedly learned of our intrusion and they are going to attempt to trap us."

The two young trainers looked at each other and effectuated a down nod, just to acknowledge that they had both understood. Fern then sent all three of his Pokémon out as well, before the two and their teams silently walked towards the door.

"Hey, Fern, if you think you see someone, don't hesitate, alright?" His addressee looked back at Vero with annoyance as they continued to advance.

Soon after they passed the doorframe, they were greeted with the sight of several machines, of weird shapes and purposes that Vero couldn't understand. There was a lot of tubes, in which the sound of pressured air passing through could be heard.

"_Perfect…" _Vero thought. _"The perfect place for an ambush…"_ He then looked at his temporary partner, who was also on his guards. Fern then noticed Vero looking at him and hissed. "What the hell are you looking at?"

At this moment, however, both of them caught the sight of a small boulder being hurled straight at them, which they barely could avoid. Vero realised that it was aiming straight at Fern's head.

"Sandile, Sand Tomb, now!" The green-themed trainer yelled, prompting his Pokémon to growl aggressively before throwing his attack.

"Hold them with String Shot, Sparky!"

Vero had decided to assist Fern in his attack by pinning their attacker and their Pokémon – he could see now that it was a Roggenrola – to the ground as sand blinded and trapped them. The little Joltik happily obliged to its trainer's command and sprayed its attack. As a result, the poor girl who had come on the offensive was all but screwed. She began to curse as she tried to wipe away the String Shot. Seeing her on the ground dirty, helpless, and covered in a… _white and sticky substance _made Vero feel quite uneasy.

"We help her or not?" He uncomfortably asked Fern.

"She's with the bomber, I thought you had to get even?" Then, he realised what Vero was referring to. "Oh, come on, how old are you… well, as long as we don't see her anymore, I don't see why we should bother. Come on, let's go."

As they went away, Vero tried – and failed – to take the time to remove the String Shot from her face, almost getting bitten in the process by the enraged woman.

After a few other corners, Fern stopped Vero with his hand, before pointing a machine, from which a leg poked out, obviously a bad attempt at a trap. Plus, there was a command plate behind, so the two non-verbally agreed to take this guy out. Vero whispered to Buddy to be ready to use Smoke Screen, while Fern told his Rowlet to use Razor Leaf.

As the two attacks were launched, the ambusher became the ambushed as the man recoiled in surprise. However, another one came from behing another piece of machinery and had his Aron rush towards them. However, a Sand Tomb and an Ember made a quick job of it and a Tackle from Rowlet on the forehead did it for the trainer. Then, the guy who had been hit with the initial attacks threw his Zubat in the fray in order to use Supersonic so he could confuse his ennemies. It worked quite well on the Pokémon… but not on the two guys currently rushing on him and slamming him down.

"Hey, asshole…" Vero began to speak, holding the man down with Sparky and Buddy ready to attack if the man in a ridiculous black suit tried anything. "Who are you? And why did you attack this train?" The man spit sideways and laughed, grinning menacingly at the young man.

"It doesn't matter to you. Soon enough, Team Meteor will be victorious and we shall…" However, before he could finish, Vero got fed up of his speech and punched him out of consciousness as his Pokémon dealt with the annoying Zubat. Fern, who had been checking the plate, turned around with a surprised look on his face.

"Team Meteor?" Seeing Vero's confused look, he elaborated. "It's an urban myth here, in Reborn, which says that a mysterious group called that is running some shady stuff. They must just be taking the name to impress others."

"I don't know, Fern. He sounded quite crazy to me, almost like some kind of cultist."

"And yet, they lose to you. If they were the real deal, I doubt you would have had it so easy…"

Vero frowned. He really was trying to renew his opinion of the green guy, but he made it unnecessarily difficult.

"Besides, we're lucky. There was the command to open some door in the back. If we hadn't got them, we would have had to come back anyways."

Then, they both went out of the room without further incident, where Florinia and Julia already were waiting.

"I notice that you two have managed to meet us again without too much injuries. Satisfying."

Despite agreeing with Julia that calling her 'Flobot' was a bit mean, Vero couldn't help but also agree that the nickname perfectly fitted her.

"Yeah. Got stuck into a couple fights. Otherwise, we're good." Fern stated, looking around him alongside Vero. They were in a room quite similar to the main entrance. There was a door at the left and one at the right. In the back, there was a big and presumably thick metal door, once again identical to the one present at the front, except that this one had a computer of some sort beside it. Since he and Fern had come from the left door, Vero assumed that the two women had come from the door at the right.

"And what do we do now?" Vero asked to Florinia. He guessed that the big door was the next step, but they still had to open it somehow.

"I am about to infiltrate the building's servers and then I will open the apparent storage room that is present before us. I will only need a few minutes." She then went to the command panel and began working on it.

"Aww, but that's boring! Couldn't we just blow it up?" Julia imposed herself into the conversation, with her hand on her hips and with an incredulous look on her face. Florinia simply continued her work, ignoring her childish outburst completely. The yellow suit wearing woman turned to the two younger men.

"Alright, so the bad guy came from here, right? In this case, there might be some explosives left! Okay, let's go find it!" She went straight into the small door that none of the two parties had come from so quickly that neither Fern or Vero actually followed her.

Soon after she got out of the rest of her group's sight, battle could be heard happening. In particular, there were a lot of electric attacks being thrown around, if the various flashes of white and bright blue that came from the room were any indication, and the human screams that could be heard let suggest that some of the guards were hit themselves.

Vero grimaced a little, partly from the worry that Julia might get herself injured – but if he and Fern made it safely, then what risk did a gym leader run? – and partly from a begrudging pity towards their enemies. After a minute, the chaos stopped, with the newly introduced silence only interrupted by Florinia's typing on a keyboard.

Then, the over-energetic leader came into the fray with her Electrode rolling slowly at her side, while she was holding a wooden box.

"Come on, boys! Help me out, we gotta place these correctly!" She said with an enthusiastic face.

"Wow, Julia minding about safety, that's a new one." Fern responded in a flat tone, obviously used to her attitude. Vero, for his part, went to give her a hand in taking the explosives and placing them in front of the door.

Then, Vero, Fern and Julia all took a few steps away and, with a wide, almost manic smile on her visage, Julia prepared the remote detonator. She turned to the two young men and nodded quickly. Her finger approached the little red button.

"You ready? Kaaa…"

…Only for the door to suddenly open wide with the heavy sound of hydraulics in action. Julia remained frozen in place, with her lower jaw slowly descending. The detonator fell from her hands and she let out an anguished – and exaggerated – scream.

"NOOOO! Floriri! How could you? And the Kaboom? What about the kaboom!"

She then rushed after her indifferent friend as their two helpers grinned at the scene, before following the two women who had entered the new orifice. It led to a corridor which made a few turns before arriving at a room _full_ of computers. There were also a lot of gauges without anything indicating what they were for, and various colorful buttons were scattered all around the place.

The more worrying detail, however, was the presence of three other people in it.

The first two, a man and a woman, didn't look all that menacing. In fact, they were dressed in the same way than the other guards that had tried to stop the group of four until now. The guy, quite well-built and tall with a strong jawline, was striking a battle pose already, Pokéball in hand. He had an uncertain look on his face and he was visibly sweating. His companion, the girl, was just as ready as him. However, she also had a much sharper look in her blue eyes, as if to compensate for her much frailer body.

They were both standing in front of the third person. This one, this man, looked much more ominous. First of all, he easily towered over everyone present in the room. Even Julia, the second tallest, was almost one foot shorter than he was. Second, his outfit, even darker than his grunts', was a lot more ample, and it sported an equally dark cape and very high collar and, thirdly, he had a patch over his left eye, in which a sort of red screen seemed incrusted. Was he some kind of cyborg?

The two groups then stationed themselves in front of each other, Vero and Fern facing the two grunts while Florinia and Julia were in front of the apparent leader.

"Oh, so you've managed to come rather quickly, after all." Said the intimidating man, lifting his chin and crossing his arms.

"Your digital security was very poor. Even an amateur could have in theory hacked into the system." Florinia responded, her face as impassive as ever. The cyclops shrugged.

"We didn't need any better. Our job here is done, after all. Now, will you be darlings and let us leave without any further notice?"

All he got as a response was glare from all four of his interlocutors, possibly indicating that no, they wouldn't. He turned to his underlings.

"Aster, Eclipse, deal with the small fry. The gym leaders are mine."

The male grunt widely smiled as he opened his Pokéball. His partner didn't seem as excited, though, and simply released her own Pokémon.

"Yes, Sirius! We'll deal with them for you, sir!"

"Aster, calm down and stay focused." Said the girl, probably Eclipse.

Vero and Fern then took a look at their Pokémon: a pair of Rockruffs. Vero's eyes frowned, as both of his Pokémon were weak to the rock type. Fern, on the contrary, grinned, since all of his were at an advantage.

"Now, rookie, you step back and watch at how the _pros_ do this, okay?" The green-themed trainer said, as his Budew and Sandile both readied up to fight his opponents. Vero looked at his aloof ally, first in disbelief, then in anger, but he decided that he would rather defeat his enemies himself to rub it into the jerk's face later, and he ordered both Buddy and Sparky to come at his side.

Meanwhile, Julia still had her Electrode and Florinia had sent out her ancestral Cradily. Sirius had brought a vicious-looking Seviper with him, and the poison-type looked at both of its opponents with glee. In the limited space they were in, bringing out more than one Pokémon at a time would be a bad idea, as the younger four trainers at the other side of the room would soon learn.

Sure enough, as soon as the battle between the grunts and the beginning trainers, chaos erupted immediately. Both Sandile, Buddy and Rowlet had used their long-ranged attacks while Sparky and Budew used their String Shot and Water Sport respectively. However, Buddy's Ember ended up incenerating Rowlet's Razor Leaf, though Sand Tomb did manage to trap one of the Rockruffs.

The other, however, instantly used the move Rock Tomb in retaliation, which managed to hit Sparky and Budew, nearly putting them out of commission in only one attack. When Aster ordered it to use Fire Fang on the little Joltik, however, Buddy immediately slammed into it, without even Vero's request.

Vero then ordered Buddy to use Ember again, but instead of a bright orange flame coming out of his mouth, it was actually a dark blue flamethrower-like attack that went for the Rockruff. The attack was powerful, even more so than Ember, and the canine rock-type found itself projected backwards, in a very bad shape.

Unfortunately, while Vero was focused on trying to understand what attack Buddy just used, the second Rockruff freed itself from the Sand Tomb and tried to use Rock Tomb as well. However, before it could strike the Distracted Vero and his Charmender, a combo of Razor Leaf and Sand Tomb hit it first, knocking it away.

"Hey, watch out, loser, you almost got hit there!" Fern said to Vero, with an irritated tone.

"Alright, I'm fed up with your shit, you heard me?" Vero said back, pointing a finger at the guy.

During this time, Sirius' battle with Florinia and Julia hadn't gone much better than his two grunts'. His Seviper, despite being his strongest Pokémon, was covered in burns dealt by Electrode's electric attacks and bruises from Cradily. A rogue rock from one of the two idiots' Rockruffs had also hit it on the head by accident. On top of this, he had only managed to land three or four attacks in total.

In short, he was losing the battle, badly. He needed to find a way to get the hell out of there as fast as possible.

"You two!" He yelled in the direction of the two grunts, who were about to be attacked themselves by Vero and Fern's remaining Pokémon. "We've already carried out the mission. We are out."

His Seviper, understanding its trainer's intentions, opened its mouth and, to the horror of both gym leaders, rookies and grunts, a purple, toxic gas began to fill the relatively small room.

"Oh shit! Eclipse, come on!" Yelled the male grunt, taking his partner by the wrist and dragging her out while Sirius' Seviper used its tail to slam Vero and Fern to the ground to prevent them from following the departing duo. Meanwhile, Florinia, who was coughing painfully due to having also been knocked over by the reptile, tried to get up and to disperse the gas.

Fortunately, Julia had a plan. A very basic one, but still a plan. She grabbed her Electrode and swung it with both her arms over her head, towards the pretty tall ceiling.

"Bob-omb! Use Eplosion!"

After this, she turned her head in order to avoid the flash of light as her Pokémon knocked itself out, ripping open the exterior wall and allowing the wind to purify the air.

Well, calling the air of the Peridot Ward 'pure' would be a bit much, but it was better than dying from gas poisoning.

Fern ordered his weakening Rowlet to accelerate the process by pushing the outside's air inside and, after a minute of chaos, silence had finally settled back into the base.

Taking heavy breaths, the four trainers opted to get out of this damned place. Once in the open again, Florinia gave a call to Ame, informing her of the current situation. She then turned to Vero and Fern.

"You two's help has been of an extreme importance today, and I thank you both for providing it." Her frigid façade then faded out for a second as she sighed in relief, then her usual expression of emotionlessness came back. "By the way, Vero, my gym is in the Onyx Ward, at the north of Obsydia, which is at the east of the Grand Hall. I have to come back to the school."

"School?" Vero asked, a bit confused.

"Yes, a school for aspiring trainers. Fern is a student there." Responded Julia. She seemed quite happy to have gotten the chance to use two explosions in less than an hour.

Vero then turned to the aforementioned Fern, who was rubbing his forehead.

"Well, sis, that's the last fucking time I come to one of your raids. I'm out, peace out, later losers." After his three-part salute, he then walked off in the direction of one of the Pokémon Centers. For his part, Vero could already see a few policemen coming over.

"So, I guess I will be going my way too…." Vero mumbled to himself, before Julia placed a friendly hand on his shoulder.

"Vero, if you want to, my gym is pretty close from here. I'm coming back right now, so you can challenge me later today, okay?"

"Oh, yeah, thanks. I just have some training left to do with my Pokémon before that. Thank you, though."

And like that, Vero departed from the old factory-turned-secret base, wondering where these bastards could have run off to.


	9. Lucia: Before the storm

Day 2, 11:00

Lucia was slowly walking through the crowded main avenue of the Obsydia Ward, observing her surroundings. She was passing right in front of a candy shop, where were sold several kinds of sugar-filled treats which, although bad to overuse for one or their Pokémon's health, could serve as pleasingly-tasting and more expensive alternatives for the medicine sold in the Pokémarts. She didn't take the time to stop there right now, though, as she had already bought a couple of things from there, like cotton candy, for example.

She had come from the main park of Obsydia, a nice space filled with grass, trees and flowers. A few benches were scattered around to allow visitors to rest a little. On top of that, a few people in colorful uniform were installing some sort of weird attraction in the middle of it, surely it was something organised for a child's party or something. All of this was a rather rare supply in the capital, and it was definitely a nice change of view, when compared to Peridot.

Yeah, it hadn't been a pleasant week. The very first day of her journey as a trainer, she gets addressed to by some shady guy at the main exit of the Grand Hall, and he proposes her to buy from him a 'very rare Pokémon, descended from dragons', only for a second guy to snatch it just after she had paid.

Then, she had to run through the entirety of the crime-filled Peridot Ward. She spent _days_ trying to find the thief that had taken her un-refundable Pokémon. Fortunately, she had managed to find the culprit, only to find out that it was actually a scam run by him and the man who had sold it to her in the first place. After losing her temper and defeating them in a two-on-one fight – which ended up wrecking the house they were in – she found out that the scammer, after faking the theft… had become the victim of a genuine one right afterwards. In exchange of her not destroying what little was left of the house, they told her that it was some kid who had run off in the Ward she was currently in. After that, she had to save a fellow trainer at her own peril from another group of thugs.

In retrospect, she may have been a bit dumb to accept the deal in the first place, she thought.

Now, after searching for the damned kid for a few hours, she had been almost everywhere, from the park, to the industrial area, to even the salon. Fortunately, the Obsydia Ward was way cleaner than the Peridot one, and the residents were sometimes cooperative here. After her searches until now, there were only two places left.

First, the Day-Care, where Pokémon could be left to grow – or reproduce – and were taken care of by an elderly couple. It was situated right next to the Pokémon center, which made the whole affair quite convenient for trainers.

The other place… was the slums. The remnants of an old part of the Ward, where the Reborn region was at its best, ten years ago. Now, it has devolved into a pile of broken buildings, with collapsing floors, makeshift constructions were all around the place, and the area was infamous for being a lair for drug dealers, crackheads and wild, hostile Pokémon.

Obviously, if Lucia was to see in both places in the chance that her stolen Pokémon was indeed there, she figured that she would begin with the less dangerous, and especially more inviting Day-Care.

After passing the candy shop, she turned at the next intersection. At the corner, there was an old building owned by some big company in Hoenn, named Silph Co. Its brick-made façade was obviously deteriorating, and the panel indicating the company's name was so damaged that Lucia barely bothered to read it. For a multinational business, she thought, they really put little effort into presentation.

Continuing through the smaller road and passing by the various apartment complexes, Lucia eventually arrived at the Pokémon Center. It was rather difficult to miss. It was right before the road ended in meters-wide fissures, just before the part of the Ward that hadn't been repaired even after ten years. Beyond the cracks, numerous collapsed buildings could be seen. While the slums were still somewhat inhabitable, this part of the city was straight-up impossible to live in. There were a lot of Powerful wild Pokémon there, and the carcasses of the houses and industries frequently fell into the cavities that were formed under the ground by the abandoned underground train rail.

After passing by the Pokémon Center, Lucia arrived at the Day-Care center, which was right next to it, as she had been told. She passed through the entrance door, activating a small bell, which startled a seemingly old lady behind a counter. The interior was rather simple, with beige carpets on the floor and a wooden counter, with the only discernable piece of modern technology visible being the computer at the far end of the room. It was one of these computers also present in the Pokémon centers, which allowed you to manage your online Pokémon storage.

The old woman looked at Lucia with a little of annoyance, which Lucia found a bit odd. The young woman then approached the elder and began to speak.

"Excuse me, madam? Would you just happen to-"

"We are sorry, but we cannot help you for now, young lady. You will have to leave for today." The old woman had rudely interrupted Lucia before she could even ask her anything. Trying her hardest to not look offended, she cleared her throat and responded.

"Lady, I don't want services, I just want to know-"

"I told you, we're closed. We have to… check our clients' Pokémon for their health today, and… yeah. Go away for now. Why are you even here if you don't want services?"

"Hey, listen, you old…" For the third time, Lucia was cut in her sentence, this time by someone entering by the front door. She turned around and noticed a small, old man, who was looking at her with a menacing and borderline angry expression on his visage.

"Didn't you understand? She told you to get out. I won't repeat it further." He said, keeping the same look on his face.

Lucia then observed the lady at the counter once again, and she noticed that she was noticeably sweating and she kept looking intensely at her. The young trainer then reached for her bag of Pokéballs and looked at the man right in the eyes.

"If you were busy today, your wife, she's your wife, right?" The man remained with the same expression and, predictably, without a word. "She wouldn't be just standing there, waiting to tell customers to go back, would she?"

"Gosh, you're an annoying one! Can't you just get away like the rest already! We have things to do!" Exclaimed the woman, no longer containing her frustration.

Lucia then looked back and forth between the couple (?). The lady was becoming agitated as she continued her rant, prompting her husband (was he really, though?) to step in and try to shut her up.

"Stop it! If you continue, she'll…" He then stopped, realising he had just done what he was trying to tell his wife (which she was definitely not) not to do. He brought a hand to his mouth in shock and, seeing Lucia's extremely suspicious expression, his face softened and he sighed.

"Well, I guess that's one witness to take care of, am I right?"

"Wait, what?"

After her reaction of audible confusion, Lucia saw the two people inexplicably remove their clothing, revealing a dark suit which was hidden within it. As they resumed talking, they also removed their remarkably well-made masks, revealing young, energetic faces. The young man jumped to the side of his partner and the two began citing… something.

"To eliminate this infestation!" Began the girl.

"To restore the art of God's own nation." Continued the boy, before they continued to alternate while reciting their weird ditty.

"To break apart the world above!"

"To find what lies beneath truth and love."

"Team Meteor!"

"Resonating with the eternal light."

"Run away now, don't try to fight!"

"For justice, that's right!" This last line, the duo yelled it in tandem.

Not exactly sure of how to react, Lucia simply stared at the two people in black, wondering if they were part of a cult or if they simply had no sense of dignity or self-awareness. The whole scene, if someone arrived right now, would look completely ridiculous- and embarrassing for everyone involved. However, her puzzlement soon turned into fright once the implications kicked in.

"Wait, if you're impostors, then where the hell are the _real_ Day-Care owners?" She questioned the Meteor grunts, getting ready to release her Pokémon.

"Ha! It wouldn't be relevant to you in any way, since you are going to get captured yourself! Your Pokémon will become the property of Team Meteor! Like all the rest!" Exclaimed the woman, who was already presenting a Pokéball in front of her. "Go, my Venomat!"

"Bagon, you got this!"

Lucia smirked as she grabbed two of her three Pokéballs. So, these goons too were going to do a two-on-one? They were in for a nasty surprise…

"Iron Fist, Sonic!"

She opened both of the Balls she had gotten a hand on and from them, came her Monferno and her Noibat. The primate bumped his fists together with brutal force while the tiny bat began flying around clumsily. In front of them, the grunts and their Pokémon were eager to begin the fight.

"Venomat, Confusion!"

The bug-type then began to focus its mental energy in order to overwhelm the Monferno's mind with it, hopefully even disorienting it. However, just before it could unleash its attack, it looked up and could only see its target currently rolling with great velocity towards it, completely covered in flames.

It didn't stand a chance and was knocked out in a single hit.

The young man's Bagon fared a bit better against Sonic. The dragon was trying to chase the Noibat around, but the grunt found out that it would be difficult to hit it in any case, since it could fly and was sticking to the ceiling, creating sound wave after sound wave to disturb the Bagon. However, the dragon-type went down just like its partner when Iron Fist took the opportunity to rush at it, fist first, when its attention was focused on the annoying bat. Its trainer did try to warn it, but the Bagon's reaction time was way too slow for it to change anything about the outcome of this one-sided fight.

"What? How!" Exclaimed the man, who found himself dumbfounded by the ease with which the black-haired trainer in front of them had not only beaten them, but in merely one hit each, no less.

As the pair looked at her with both dread and shock, Lucia looked at them right in the eyes while

Lucia, now sporting a more relaxed face, looked at her Noibat. She ordered it to blast its sound waves at the duo for a few seconds. After this was done and the two Meteor grunts were winded enough, she approached the girl and then kneed in front of her.

"Now, what do you have done with the _real_ couple? If you did something bad, I swear I'll-"

"No, we haven't killed them! They're just hidden! I'm telling the truth! I'll tell them where they are, even!" For all of the bark earlier about whatever organisation they worked for, she hardly bit when the opportune moment came about. "They are in a warehouse, in-"

"What the hell are you doing? Shut it already!" Yelled her partner. The duo then both stopped saying anything, only staring at Lucia or her overpowered Monferno, before the young trainer made a decision.

"Well, since you aren't going to talk either way, I guess I'll start off with the hints you gave me." She winked at the female grunt, who mumbled angrily in return. "Until then, I will just call the police on you guys. I don't think you can run far away from here in that time…"

She then dialed the emergency services on her Pokégear before informing the authorities of the situation. She then looked back at the two defeated goons. The girl looked down in shame, but the guy had an inexplicably smug grin on his punchable face.

"What the hell are you looking at like that?" Asked Lucia, a bit irritated.

"You just wait and see. We told you only a few minutes ago, the world will break apart!"

"Whatever, have fun rambling about that crap to the cops."

She then exited the Day-Care, in order to get some fresh air, while waiting for the police to arrest these two idiots. She then suddenly realised that she hadn't found any clue about her thief or her rare Pokémon. Damn it, she would have to go to the slums, after all.

However, as she walked a bit in the direction of the Pokémon Center, some rumbling could be felt under the ground.

'_Another earthquake? After ten years?'_ Lucia asked herself mentally. The vibrations soon became accompanied by some sort of abominable screech which pierced her ears and everyone's who was around.

Then, all around her, sprouts suddenly began to burst out of the asphalt.


	10. Alice and Ari: The Jasper Ward

Day 2, 10:00

Ari was looking at her new Pokéball with excitation as she was getting ready to depart from Alice's apartment. Her friend had been kind enough to go get the starters of both of them. Ame knew of Ari's condition and had accepted to exceptionally allow for the Goth to take a starter on behalf of another trainer. Of course, she had picked Turtwig for Ari, which the latter had decided to name 'Leafhead'. It would be a bit weird when it becomes a Torterra, but Ari wasn't exactly good at coming up with names.

Now, while the headaches had mostly stopped, she found out that she could still feel a bit confused if doing too much effort, or if she felt too much excitement, apparently, if her current dizziness was anything to go by.

Despite her fragile state right now, Ari couldn't wait any longer to go and train with her new little partner, the doc's opinion be damned. The two girls thus decided to get out of the apartment for the day. They would go at the Jasper Ward, which was just at the north of Peridot. The streets were a bit cleaner, crime didn't completely infest the place, and there was a nice forest at the west of it where Alice and Ari could train their Popplio and Turtwig.

Alice was currently assuring her mother that she was not going to do anything dangerous or illegal while she's gone, which Ari found a bit hypocritical from the older woman to be worried about, even if it was a good concern to have. Sooner, Alice had told her that she had never gotten into trouble with the law – the gangs around were another story, sadly –, making Ari suspect that the mother thought that _she_ was going to be some kind of bad influence. She sighed heavily at the thought. What, just because she had bleached her hair among other… more intense changes, she was going to be some troublemaker punk?

Luckily, Alice had convinced her to let her go on this day trip with her best friend, at least, for today. Ari heard the sound of Alice's footsteps closing in and turned around to her smiling bestie.

"So, we can go?"

"Pretty sure we can, it's going to be an excellent day, and I can feel it! Nothing can go wrong, now…"

Ari lifted her eyebrows and rolled her eyes. That's exactly what _not_ to say before… well, anything, really.

"You're bringing your other two as well?" The ebony blonde asked as she looked around, not catching any sight of either the Buneary or the Minccino.

"Yes, I wished to take them with me on my journey. They are with me since so long… They are practically family for me!"

'_Gosh, Alice…'_ Ari thought. _'How did you stay so innocent in a place like this?'_

"Yeah, I guess. I'll have to look for a catch myself, eventually. Nothing urgent, though." Indeed, unlike this Vero guy who seemed quite determined to become champion or all this crap, she just wanted to have a good time, making discoveries and whatnot.

After preparing the supplies for the day (food, water, some Pokémon meds if anything went wrong), the two girls set off for the Jasper Ward. Alice knew her way quite well in the city, so she could tell where to pass and where to… well, not to pass.

As they walked, they began talking once more about their different experiences in the last few years. Or, at least, that was the intent. In reality, it was Ari who was telling her stories about her life in Unova. The whole mess with Team Plasma around a decade ago had left in the Region some big scars just before Ari's family immigrated in. Alice's anecdotes were mostly composed of stories about how some group had supplanted the current one, and how her mother's boyfriend at the time was an ass.

Quickly enough, the two girls arrived at the tunnel which connected Peridot to Jasper. Since the ground of the latter was higher than the former's, stairs had to be passed in order to travel from one to the other. From the ground of Peridot, there was a thick brick wall at the very end of the Ward on the top of which could be seen the buildings of Jasper.

After arriving in the new Ward, Ari immediately noticed the fresher air floating around. Unlike the Peridot Ward, where the level of the ground was barely over the water and the smog constantly got stuck, Wards like Jasper, Beryl or Lapis benefitted from their altitude in this regard.

They then began walking in the direction of the Malchous Forest, at the west. It was a beautiful, thick forest – as the name implies – miraculously relatively untouched by civilastion until now. According to rumors, the wild Pokémon that lived there and in the Rhodochrine Jungle next to the Beryl Ward, just up north from where they were, were quite crafty.

Once they entered the woods, they went in search of a place to settle at, a place clear enough so that they could move around freely without losing sight of each other due to the trees.

After finding a place that was good enough for the task, they released their Pokémon and began their training. Ari found out that Clumsy the Buneary and Furball the Minccino had already been taught in combat by Alice before, and that they were quite capable on top of that. In fact, it seemed that the two starters were the ones to need training the most. Ari passed her morning teaching her Turtwig about how to fight and how to apply some of its moves in battle. Fortunately, Leafhead was a quick learner, but while he was eager to do so, he was still limited by his pretty slow body. Thus, Ari decided to teach him how to use the Razor Leaf technique in order to compensate for his limited range and his low speed with a long-ranged attack. It was pretty hard, however, since the Turtwig had to learn it all from the ground up. On top of it all, she regularly had to stop for a few minutes due to her headaches.

After two hours of trying to get the move right, Ari decided that Leafhead deserved a little break. Besides, it was noon and she was quite hungry. After petting her Turtwig a little, Ari turned to where Alice and her own three Pokémon were and she called out to her.

"Yo! Al!" Yelled the ebony blonde, startling her gothic friend. She seemed to be distracted. "Are you hungry yet? I could use some sandwiches right now…" She then brought her hand to her stomach while mumbling in anticipation.

However, she then noticed that Alice was not looking in her direction, right now, or even her Pokémon's. She was staring at some random point in the woods, and her Minccino seemed to be looking at the same place.

"You… You okay, hon'?"

Then, as Ari continued to address her, the Goth seemed to finally return to reality, or at least, she acknowledged her friend's calls.

"Yes. I am." Alice took a last look behind her before she continued. She held her hands on her chest, as if she was nervous. "Furball began staring there and… I saw something move, I think."

"Oh, it's just that?" The ebony blonde chuckled a little. "You gotta get out of the city more often. It was probably just some wild Pokémon, we could even go see what it is this afternoon! What do you think?"

Alice simply nodded and went to Ari's side before the two began to unpack their and their Pokémon's food. The Goth, though, didn't seem any less nervous.

To Ari's relief, her friend seemed to have some appetite, today. She thought about the fact that they had been exercising for a good chunk of the morning and that the day before, Alice had been living a very stressful day. Ari hoped that she had just jumped to conclusion yesterday.

As for the four Pokémon, Alice's Buneary and Minccino were eating together, as they probably had for the few months that their trainer had them. Idol, her Popplio, was trying to get along with Leafhead, but the small turtle was simply too hungry to care about socialising right now and merely acknowledged the water-type before going back to eating.

After she was done, Ari slowly laid on her back, on the grass. She could feel the warmth of the sun of her face as she let digestion make her sleepier by the minute. She was snapped out of her quick nap by Alice's Popplio, who had begun sniffing her sides and thus tickling her quite efficiently. Leafhead, meanwhile, was more than happy to imitate his mistress.

Alice, for her part, had taken a much smaller meal and went back to training her three partners. Quickly, she made Clumsy and Furball perform fitness exercises as she trained Idol to perfect her Bubble technique, and to make it more efficient.

Suddenly, though, Alice heard something weird. It wasn't shuffling in some bush, or a branch snapping, like one would expect to hear in a forest. No, this sounded almost like… a voice!

She commanded her Pokémon to stop moving as she focused entirely on what she was hearing. It couldn't be her imagination, she thought, she had heard someone talking, and not so far away…

After the ambient ruckus that had been going on after dinner, the sudden silence hadn't gone unnoticed by Ari, who slowly raised up and looked at the Goth with puzzlement. Then, the pair clearly caught the sound of yelling in the distance, accompanied by a few other faint voices. It was in the opposite direction of the city, and thus even deeper into the Malchous forest than they were. The two girls then shared a look and silently agreed to go after the source of the voice. They called back all of their Pokémon, in order to avoid having them making noise and getting them into trouble.

"Al, are there supposed to be people around here, normally?" Whispered Ari, as they were slowly but surely getting closer to their target.

"There are, but it's mostly trainers, like us, not people doing some kind of work… and we should have noticed them passing by…" The Goth responded, with a very unsure look on her face. Had she been alone, she would have probably just ran back to her mother's place…

As they approached further, they could now begin to understand the words exchanged between the several strangers.

"But why do _we_ have to stay here? Surely Taka can defend it by himself, right?"

"I didn't decide our roles, but I think the boss thinks that some strong people are on our traces…"

"Geez, Simon, could you sound any more stupid?"

Alice and Ari hid behind a bush close to the unknown group as they discussed. The ebony blonde took a look and confirmed to her friend its composition: two men and two women, all in heavy dark suits.

"Shut up, now, it should begin soon. Until then, we wait."

"Still, guys…" One of the women said. "Don't you think it's a bit extreme? I see why, for the train, but this…"

The two girls quickly glanced at each other in order to confirm that they had heard it right. They were involved in the train attack? Moreover, the woman implied that they were about to do something _worse_!

"What about it?" Said the second woman. "There is no questioning it. And no more word about it, alright?"

Ari and Alice then looked at each other again, this time both of them sporting a look of pure, uncontained dread. Alice nervously shook her head and pointed her chin in the direction of the city, a gesture at which Ari vigorously nodded before the pair tried to sneakily get away. Unfortunately, in their haste, Alice tripped on a branch and startled a bush.

"Huh? Hey! HEY!" One of the two men began to scream as Alice and Ari abandoned the silent method and opted to run as fast as they could while two of the dark-clothed people began to chase them.


	11. Vero: First trial

Day 2, 12:30

Vero was walking in the direction of the electric power plant of Peridot, where Julia's gym was stationed. He smirked as he approached the building, sure of his upcoming victory.

Since the assault of the base of Team Meteor, as they called themselves, Vero had been trying to come up with some new moves for Buddy and Sparky, while anticipating what Julia may have in her bag for him.

First, he had begun with Buddy's training. He had gone to the Pokémart and spent the rest of his funds for a new, cheaper Pokédex, which did not contain every Pokémon's data, but at least it could tell him a thing or two about what kind of abilities his Charmender had.

An interesting discovery he had made revealed that the Charmender evolutionary line was able to infuse their flames with a mystical energy, allowing them to use the attack known as Dragon Rage. What was particularly promising about this was the fact that apparently, no matter the power of the user or target, the technique always inflicted consistent damage. How it even worked, however, was an utter mystery to this day and various scientists were still having sleepless nights over it.

Thus, Vero had decided to force Buddy to breathe his fire over and over, until he couldn't anymore, at which point he would bring him to get healed. Since Dragon Rage was merely another application of his basic flames, the young trainer figured that he only needed to practice the move and gain a bit more endurance in order to tap into this weird power. After an hour, he had decided to move on to Sparky, while Buddy would continue to practice his fire breathing – and smoke creation, by the same occasion.

For the little bug, he had the idea of teaching it to combine its electricity and String Shot ability to create an electric web, which could be used to both inflict reliable damage and slow down the opponent. He was certain there was a name for this kind of move, but Vero didn't quite remember. Of course, it wouldn't actually be this useful against what seemed to be an electric gym, but it was something good to use later. Sparky actually managed to create the new move rather quickly, which was quite a relief for its trainer, who still had to check on Buddy.

Around noon, after having perfected the Ember move, the Charmender began to feel something burst inside of him, as if a switch of some sort had just been turned on. Since his trainer had told him to try to use any kind of new power he may discover, the Flame Pokémon tested it to see what would happen. To his surprise, instead of his usual, orange flames, it was a bright blue burst which erupted out of his mouth and burned clean the ground in front of him.

Now, the gym leader's strategy. Vero had heard before coming to Reborn that each one of them used some sort of field advantage in order to one-up the challengers. Vero didn't really like this, he thought that it demonstrated a certain cowardice to not fight on an even ground, but hey. If he could them at their own game, it would only make the victory even sweeter, right?

In any case, Vero figured that, obviously, this field would favor electric attacks and Pokémon. Luckily, he had a Joltik, which was immune to being paralysed by such attacks thanks to its own electric typing. Then, there was Buddy, who was becoming quite fast and would be probably able to wipe the floor with her weaker fighters, and maybe even the stronger ones, thanks to his new attack. Vero wasn't sure, though. He wasn't willing to use Sparky as an experiment target.

After entering the gym, Vero found himself face to face with an enormous metal door, quite like the ones at the Meteor base, blocking his path at the front. When he looked around, there was a technician waiting for him, next to a Voltorb. As he approached the man, the latter raised his hand to talk to him.

"Welcome trainer. Before challenging Julia, you will have to complete her puzzle."

"Which is..?" Asked Vero, with a raised eyebrow.

"Basically, you bring the Voltorbs to the doors, they explode and let you pass. You also fight someone like me before you can take them."

"So, it is just a series of fights with an extra 'explosion' step?"

"Yes." Both of them shrugged at the thought of the concept. It fitted Julia perfectly, Vero thought.

The technician then sent out a Mareep and Vero released Buddy, and the battle began. It was short-lived, however. It turned out that Buddy's new Dragon Rage really _was_ just as strong as the Pokédex article claimed.

After finishing the few fights that he had to perform before being able to fight Julia – all won handily by Buddy – Vero entered the room in which the Gym battle was supposed to take place. The energetic, green-haired woman was standing there with an excited look on her face.

The floor was filled with multi-colored, square-shaped tiles. There were a few machines at the side of room, of which purposes Vero, once again, couldn't tell. Behind the spot where the gym leader was waiting, there was a huge banner, on which could be read, in exact words: 'KA BOOM!'. Finally, Vero could feel his hair slightly rise from the sheer static in the air, which confirmed that the place would be advantageous for electric-types.

"Alright, so Vero!" Julia exclaimed cheerfully. "Let me explain to you how this will go: we are going to fight, obviously. However, since you are a beginner, I will have to use a team tailored for novices like you. If you still lose, you will be able to challenge me again without getting through the same trials again. You can also switch Pokémon whenever you want. Got it?"

She was trying to be nice, Vero could tell. However, calling him a beginner and a novice, on top of insinuating that he would lose against a purposefully weak team, hit Vero right where it hurt, in the pride. His eye slightly twitched as he got a hold of his first Pokéball.

"Ready, Julia?"

"Ready! Go, Helioptile!"

"Go, Sparky!"

The two Pokémon materialised on the charged battlefield, as the two trainers examined each other. Vero noticed that, all of a sudden, Julia had adopted a much more serious expression, lowering her chin and frowning, all while keeping her cheerful grin.

"Helioptile, use Quick Attack!

The reptilian Pokémon then sprung into the Joltik's direction. However, Vero had seen it coming and ordered Sparky to jump in order to avoid getting hit. Then, he yelled:

"Now, use your electric web!"

Thanks to the practice it had with the new move, Sparky was able to shoot plenty of electricity-charged web all over the arena. Helioptile was taken by surprise and stepped on some of it, promptly shocking itself.

Luckily for Vero, while electric-types were resistant to their own, they weren't completely immune to the typing's damage, and with the place amplifying it and Helioptile being weaker than it should be on purpose, it meant that the tactic had managed to not only slow down the reptile, but also to inflict a good chunk of damage.

"Hyperbolic Charge!"

As the energetic leader called the attack, Helioptile's extension of skin around its ears stretched, becoming almost like organic veils, as an arc of strong current formed around it. Sparky braced itself as the attack hit it, sapping it of its own energy. When it was done, Helioptile, though not actually healed, was now may more vigorous, while the Joltik had been weakened a little. Vero smirked. If so little from his Pokémon had given so much to Julia's in comparison, then Sparky clearly had the endurance advantage.

He was still a bit disappointed, though, that his foe was so weak, relatively speaking. He would have liked the battle to be a bit more even. He ordered Sparky to rush at the slowed down Helioptile and, after a few strikes of Fury Cutter, it was down. Julia returned it before she sighed and then stomped her foot. Vero deduced that she hadn't expected him to be _this_ good, heh?

The yellow suit wearing woman then sent out her second Pokémon. This one was a little yellow bird that Vero did not recognise. He quickly got out his Pokédex and scanned its name: _Oricorio_.

The little feathered Pokémon seemed to be dancing at all times, jumping from foot to foot while waving its pom-pom like 'hands' like a cheerleader would. If Electrode hadn't been Julia's apparent ace, Vero suspected that this one would have been a darn good candidate.

The battle went on once again, as the opposing Oricorio jumped in the air before throwing blades of compressed air at Sparky. Fortunately, once again, the bug's diminutive size worked to its advantage as it effortlessly bounced back and forth to avoid the hardly aim-able attacks.

"Alright, now, try to get this one with your web too!"

At first, Vero had feared that the Oricorio was capable of flying, but after examining it further, he concluded that it wouldn't be the case. Not only were its wings very ill-fitted for any good take off, but it had just needed to jump to throw a few good attacks – and it fell back on the floor right after. Thus, it wouldn't be able to escape Sparky's web easily.

Sure enough, just like Helioptile earlier, Oricorio was put down by the sticky fluid then knocked out by the tiny bug's vicious physical blows.

This time, Julia took some time to think before throwing her next Pokémon in. She had already two fighters down, and she had hardly inflicted any heavy damage on Vero's first one. She knew that the Joltik's defences weren't high, but she needed reliable offensive options to at least _touch it_…

Then, her pensive state turned back into a cockier one, as she prepared her next Ball.

"Go, Emolga!"

Out of it came the little rodent, emitting adorable cries as it began to glide around. Vero frowned a little. This one would definitely be hard to hit, and it seemed quite quick as well.

"Electric web, now!"

"Dodge and use Charge Beam!"

The Emolga then effectuated a loop upwards in order to avoid Sparky's move, before firing a laser of electricity from its mouth. The Joltik barely had time to evade the hit. Luckily, it did, since it had left a nasty burn on the floor tiles it had hit. Immediately after the attack, electric energy erupted from the flying rodent's body, making it visibly convulsing. Vero didn't know what effect using that move had on it, but Vero was certain that he didn't want Sparky to get hit by that.

Then, he noticed something interesting: the Emolga was slowly losing both momentum and altitude. He should have noticed it sooner, as the Pokémon could only glide, and thus not truly flying. Now, he knew that Sparky could get at least some openings.

Then, Julia ordered her Pokémon to fire Charge Beam again, and this time, it not only left a burn where it landed, but also a _visible trail_! It was even more powerful than before! Fortunately, this time, no visible augmentation of power had happened, but Vero was still worried. Emolga getting closer meant that Sparky would have less time to dodge. Fortunately, it was close and slow enough to try to replicate the little trick it had pulled on Fern's Rowlet.

"Jump on it, Sparky!"

"Wait, what?"

Gladly obeying its master, the Joltik then sprung towards Emolga, and it managed to get a grip on its back, further weighing it down and assuring that it couldn't hit the bug with its Charge Beam. This time, however, Vero knew that Thunder Wave wouldn't affect the other electric-type, so he opted for a different approach…

"Now, strike it!"

Sparky understood well enough and used Fury Cutter on the rodent's back. While it wasn't particularly effective, after three uses, the accumulated damaged had visibly taken its toll on the Emolga.

Before it crashed, however, it positioned itself so its back would be coming first to the ground, effectively crushing Sparky under its – admittedly little – weight. It then quickly got back on its feet and, on the orders of Julia, fired Charge Beam before Sparky could react, knocking it out.

Vero then returned the downed Joltik in its Pokéball, nodding.

"You did well, little guy. Now, it's Buddy's turn."

He was not going to lie to himself, the situation was pretty bleak. The Emolga may be weakened, but Julia had three other, presumably even more powerful Pokémon at her side, while he was reduced to his starter.

"Phew, this little one was quite good, how many do you have left?" Julia said, panting slightly.

"Just one. You?"

"One? Wow, I mean, I use six, like every other leader…"

Gosh dang it. Now, Vero had to defeat _four_ Pokémon with only one. He seriously hoped that his new ace in the hole would cut it. Julia simply crossed her arms with an uncertain look on her face.

After he sent out Buddy, the duel between him and Emolga went down rather quickly. While Emolga's power was still ridiculously high, it had been grounded and injured by Sparky, which meant that the Charmender could make a short job of it. One less, Vero thought.

"Okay, you have come far, Vero, but it ends here! Voltorb, come!"

The Ball-like Pokémon jumped out of its capsule before bouncing on the floor. It looked at Buddy with its menacing eyes.

"Now, use Rollout!"

"Buddy, Dragon Rage!"

As the Voltorb began rolling towards the Charmender, the latter released its torrent of blue, draconic flames, which engulfed the electric-type and sent it flying backwards before slamming it to the wall. After the attack dissipated, it was knocked out, to both Vero and Julia's surprise.

"Okay, I'll admit that I didn't see it coming…" Julia admitted, before getting her fifth Pokémon in the fray. "Go, Plusle!"

After the little rodent prepared itself, it and Buddy engaged into battle. The Chamender was swiping around its claws while the more agile Plusle evaded them and dealt weaker, but difficult to avoid hits.

Vero decided to turn the fight in his favor and ordered Buddy to use Ember, prompting the Flame Pokémon to throw its inferno at the Plusle. It managed to escape part of it, but Vero could clearly see that it was hurt by the move. However, it got back up easily and rushed the Charmender while enveloping itself in electricity, probably the move Spark.

Buddy didn't let himself be hit that easily, however, and he blocked it by activating his Scratch attack. Unfortunately, the Plusle was actually physically stronger than Buddy, and it began to push back, bit by bit.

Vero watched as his Pokémon tried to struggle against the superior force pressing against him, but sooner than later, he would get knocked off his feet.

Then, the Charmender seemed to get a sudden burst in strength as he found himself capable of pushing the rodent back. After the clash was stopped, a white light began to glow from Buddy's whole body, forcing Vero and Lucia to shield their eyes.

When the blinding light went away, Buddy's body erupted in flames instead, enveloping the floor around him in them, as it looked down on Plusle, bearing his claws.

Buddy had changed, he was no longer a Charmender… he had evolved into a Charmeleon!

Snapping out of his awe, Vero quickly resumed the battle, and Buddy fought with renewed vigor as he was now able to match Plusle's speed. Eventually, after propelling Plusle with Scratch and blasting it with Ember, the Pikachu wannabe was down too.

Buddy roared in victory, before he adopted a toothy grin and leaned forward, ready to take on whatever Julia was sending next.

"I gotta say, Vero… you are impressive. I don't even think I can predict the result of the battle. However, you are now facing my ace! ELECTRODE!"

With this, she sent the Ball away with all of her might and it opened mid-route, in the middle of the arena, before continuing its travel and landing at Vero's feet. The Ball-like Pokémon that had come out was staring at the newly evolved Charmeleon with a wide grin of its own.

"Roll sideways, and use SonicBoom!"

Immediately after she said these words, her Electrode obeyed and threw a few sonic blasts aimed at Buddy, who managed to dodge most of them. The last one, however, hurt it pretty much. Vero decided to stop screwing around and to go all out.

"Jump, and use Smoke Screen!"

As he had done many times before, Buddy began to throw out a thick dark could, through which small lightning could be seen forming because of the static electricity.

"Electrode, use Rollout! Find it!"

The Electrode followed her command, but not being able to see where it was going wasn't doing it any favors. Buddy simply waited for the right opportunity to strike, which presented itself in the form of his foe hitting a wall. It then rushed to it while it was trying to pick momentum back and fired his Dragon Rage, to which the Electrode actually responded with a Charge Beam attack, which eroded a part of the blue flames before it could get it.

However, now Electrode was weakened enough that it could be defeated if a fully-powered Dragon Rage hit it at that point. Vero decided not to act too hastily, just in case his foe had a hidden trump card which could turn the tables on him and Buddy.

It became clear, though, that Julia didn't have much more tactics up her sleeve, as even now she simply ordered her Electrode to throw its Charge Beam attack. Buddy was ready and avoided the blow, before his trainer ordered him to use his Ember. He wanted to avoid overusing Dragon Rage, especially if the opponent was likely to dodge. As the Charmeleon roared, a torrent of bright orange flames engulfed the Electrode and sent it rolling backwards. Nearly done for, the ball-like Pokémon re-balanced itself upwards and tried to attack one last time, only to be met with a second Dragon Rage, which ended the match once and for all.

Vero breathed heavily as he stood in place for a few seconds. For one moment, he was under the impression that Julia was going to send out another Pokémon, but to his surprise, she began walking towards him. Only when she came with a badge in hand did he realise what was going on.

"Wow, Vero…" Julia was panting, as if she was out of energy – which would be the first time since Vero met her. "I knew you were a good trainer, but I didn't expect to lose to _two_ 'mons only. Guess I shouldn't have underestimated you, now should I?"

'_Damn right!'_ Vero thought.

"Anyway, now, here is your Volt Badge, proof of your victory in my gym! Oof, I'm so tired now…" Julia let the small pin fall into Vero's palm. She then opened her mouth wide as she yawned, before she continued to talk. "Hey, Vero, could I ask you a little favor?"

"Yeah, sure, what is it?"

"Floriri had called me an hour ago or so, she wants me to go see her for some business in Obsydia or whatever… could you go and… and…"

Her head then dropped, but her body stood perfectly still. After Vero stared at her, confused, he began to hear what sounded like… snores? Did she seriously just fall asleep just like that?

She had asked him to go see Florinia, huh? Well, she was another gym leader and it's not like Vero had anything better to do anyways.

Before exiting the building, he took the time to warn one of the technician about Julia's current state. The only response he got was his interlocutor calling out to another and joking about the fact that they would need to replenish the coffee reserves, at which some chuckles could be heard from the other end of the power plant.

Once he got outside, however, Vero noticed some people getting out of their homes as the ground began to rumble. They were all looking in the direction of the Obsydia Ward and, when Vero took a look himself, his eyes widened in shock.

Enormous plants were currently rising from where the Ward was, but the most ominous thing was the thick smoke coming up, as well as the distant noises of buildings crumbling.

_What the hell was going on again?_


	12. Decibel: The cavalry is here!

Day 2, 13:00

The leaves of the ground of the Malchous forest were being stomped on by the racing trainer and their Pokémon. Once in a while, they would stop for a few seconds in order to check if they were still going in the right direction.

The Pokémon, a Gallade, was perfect for the job. A particularity of its species was that it was able to track down and somewhat read minds, which made it extremely useful when tracking down someone.

The duo then stopped once again, as the trainer was coming out of breath.

The person currently resting was a rather tall one, almost at six feet of height. They were covered in a heavy, dark long coat that anyone with some sanity would avoid in the current heat. They had bright skin and bright, blue eyes which, most of the time, conveyed a feeling of joy – or naiveté –, but right now, there was nothing but pure seriousness. As for their hair, it was as white as it could possibly be, elegantly combed into long and thick packs of hair.

Once the trainer had rested long enough, they resumed their course, but they were now going slower, as the Gallade indicated to its trainer that they were closing by their target.

After another five minutes of careful walking through the uneven terrain, the duo began to hear voices from not far from them. They took cover behind a particularly large tree as they could now see what they had been looking for: a group of Team Meteor grunts. The trainer grinned, but their Gallade seemed confused. It then designated to its master a bush rather close by, and the trainer noticed someone hiding behind it as well. They seemed very nervous, and the trainer deduced that they were probably here by accident.

The two then brought their attention back to the grunts, who were still discussing their plans in the open.

"I didn't decide our roles, but I think the boss thinks that some strong people are on our traces…"

The mysterious trainer chuckled silently a bit at these words. I only these idiots knew… they were followed not only by them, but someone else as well!

"Shut up, now, it should begin soon. Until then, we wait."

"Still, guys…" One of the women said. "Don't you think it's a bit extreme? I see why, for the train, but this…"

At this, however, the trainer's expression went _livid_. How _dare_ she act like they were only now crossing a boundary?

While they ranted internally about the grunts' hypocrisy and evilness, a little sound suddenly brought them back to reality: the other listeners, who the trainer could now see that they were two girls, had messed up an attempt at sneaking away and now two of the grunts were running after them.

The white-haired person looked at their Gallade and nodded. The Pokémon then abruptly popped out of existence… or at least, out of that particular location.

As the two goons were trying to catch up with the fleeing girls, they were all of a sudden swept aside with two swift moves of violent force, with the man crashing into the ground face-first. His partner didn't have as much luck as her head rammed right into a tree, her body falling to the ground like a ragdoll.

The man, after spitting out a little dirt, then looked up to see the Gallade coming to him. Panicking, he tried to grab a Pokéball to try to fight back, but the Pokémon had predicted the move and threw a sharp blast of psychic energy to the ground. This way, he was incapacitated, blinded by the dirt. The other two were coming in support, after hearing their companions get into what sounded like a pretty brutal fight. They were met with the sight of a Gallade holding one of their colleagues' unconscious body on the floor, while the other was held by the collar by a weirdly-clothed guy… or was it a girl?

"Wha…" The still-awake woman stuttered, upon finding out that the other two had been so thoroughly defeated. Her attention then went on the trainer. "Who the hell are you? Answer!"

The mysterious figure then dropped their male companion on the floor before they took in a deep breath. As the grunts braced themselves, what came was rather… unexpected to them.

The white-haired trainer raised their left hand high in the air, while also bringing their right behind them. They then proceeded to make their left hand perform a clockwise turn until it was in the direction of their right, before bringing it forward as they pointed at the two grunts, while their body turned to the side. The whole thing seemed like it was a bad attempt at striking a pose or something.

"I…" Began the trainer, before pausing for dramatic effect. "… am Decibel." Another pause, and the man noticed that the Gallade was performing the same pose as its trainer. "I am the one who steps up when others flee, the one who corners evil at every opportunity! According to one of your eloquent colleagues, I am also known as that 'stupid strong guy always on your asses'. Well, let me tell you… tell you…" Then, Decibel had a pensive expression before their face lighted up. "… that of kicking butt, I did take classes…"

"Are you trying to rhyme or what?" Asked the man, not amused by their attacker's ridiculous attitude. "It's not a Saturday cartoon show. How did you come here and why?"

"Well, I thought it was obvious. I want to stop you, what else?" The white-haired trainer's pointer finger then slightly lowered in loss of enthusiasm, before raising it again, grinning widely. "Come on, play along, I like doing things the grandiose way!"

"I'll show you something grandiose, boy, you'll see…"

"Tara, wait!"

Despite the plea of her partner, the woman known as Tara then threw her Pokéball in front of her, from which came out a Golbat.

Decibel, abandoning their pose, sighed in disappointment and pouted.

"So, you want to do this the hard way? Fine." The trainer then crossed their arms as their Gallade prepared for a quick fight. "But just before we begin, who would be the more likely to reveal your team's plans if I let them conscious?"

The male grunt gulped at the cheerfulness with which Decibel, who was infamous in Team Meteor for their prowess in combat, casually said this line. Tara, for her part, was far from impressed.

"I will bring the Team's secrets in my tomb, you buffoon!" At this, Decibel shrugged.

"The dude, then, good to know. Go easy on him, Lancelot." Their Gallade nodded as it braced itself further for battle as Tara's teeth clinched in her rage.

"Golbat, Air Cutter!"

However, when the attack went in their direction, Decibel and their Gallade nonchalantly stood there, until Lancelot teleported them both out of harm's way. Tara blinked once as her Golbat recoiled in shock.

"Simon, where did they go?"

Her companion, focused on where the trainer had previously been, failed to notice the lean figure behind him who then swiftly hit him on the back of the head, knocking him out. Seeing this, Tara froze as she prepared for a rather one-sided battle.

Then, unexpectedly, an few boulders came in Decibel's direction just before they could order their Gallade to attack, forcing the latter to step in and defend its trainer. Tara looked around and saw her other male colleague, who was battered but at least conscious.

"Get the hell away from here! I'll hold him off, warn the boss!"

Tara nodded and took Simon on her shoulder with difficulty as the other grunt was busy ordering his Boldore to use Rock Tomb.

After he was quickly defeated, the grunt held a victorious smile as Decibel approached him.

"I should have guessed that you would be trouble. Now, imagine what kind of good you could have done if you had applied this kind of courage out of this team…" The white-haired trainer said, shaking their head.

"Heh… this is beyond you, kid… besides, now you'll never get them, they'll be far before you're done with me!"

Decibel then began to laugh loudly, before coming back to a more serious, if still smirking, expression.

"I will just use Lancelot's powers again. _Besides_, I only need you to tell me your plans, and then I can stop the upcoming crisis."

"If Tara didn't make it clear already, we don't confess. We would rather die…"

Decibel's smirk then turned into a furious frown. This kind of attitude… it was just the right one for a true hero, but those who had it and were _evil_ were the worst of the worst.

"I'll teach you that there is a fascinating lot of things you can live through…"

**Alright, a bit short, but I hope I have done well in introducing Decibel.**

**Seriously, he is currently the character I have the most fun with when I write. Do you feel the same?**


	13. Vero and Lucia: The slums (part 1)

Day 2, 14:00

As Vero passed in front of the Great Hall, the destruction of the Obsydia Ward became more and more apparent. Buildings were being brought to the ground by those giant sprouts from hell as if they were nothing.

It was pretty hard to walk in the direction of the Ward, since a lot of people were currently being evacuated as their homes were being destroyed. Vero had to push his way through the crowd to arrive to his destination.

In order to pass from Peridot to Obsydia, you had to climb stairs, which led to a footbridge. The latter made some kind of circle around the Great Hall, and there were three different exits. The first one, where Vero came from, was in the direction of Peridot. The second one, at north, was to go to Lapis and the third one, at the east, was for Obsydia.

Once Vero arrived at the entrance of the Ward, he remarked that the damage was actually pretty far at the east. The smaller buildings, which were more in the western part of Obsydia, were relatively untouched. In fact, now that he could see through the main street, he saw that the concentration of plants didn't begin until a few intersections ahead.

Now that he was going to enter, however, two policemen who were guarding the entrance stopped him right in his path.

"Young man, I'm going to ask you to turn around. The Obsydia Ward is going to be locked down, and at that point nothing is coming in or out. Alright?"

As Vero was going to try – and probably fail – to argue, he heard a familiar, monotone voice behind him.

"Vero, what is the reason behind your presence here? Are you aware of Julia's whereabouts?" She was glaring at him with her cold eyes.

"Actually, she asked me to come and meet you myself, she… kinda fell asleep."

Florinia nodded slowly while closing her eyes, as if such antics were normal from Julia's part. The green-clothed woman then turned to the policemen.

"Vero, here, is with me. His assistance during our recent raid of a Team Meteor headquarter was useful, therefore I grant him the permission to overpass the lockouts."

The young man then followed Florinia as he sheepishly nodded at the officers who let them pass. Once they had entered, there weren't much people running around, since most of the people had rightfully decided to get to safety before they found themselves stuck in this death trap. Florinia then turned to Vero and stated flatly:

"I am going to investigate the reasons of this crisis. If you find anything, you must inform me through your Pokégear or come to me in person. Understood?"

Vero awkwardly smiled and nodded in response, not exactly willing to admit that he had been robbed by a group of thugs literally the day before, therefore losing his -Gear and -Dex alike.

Vero watched as Florinia walked towards the increasing mass of vegetal tentacles near some kind of candy shop. He then looked around a little and, from the intersection he was at, he noticed a Pokémon Center, which he figured would be a good place to start his trip in this hellhole.

As he walked in the empty road, he stayed careful and avoided the sprouts that were literally bursting through the ground. He observed them and noticed that they were growing at an alarming rate, twisting as they did so. Fortunately, though, the ones that had grown through buildings had slowed down, and there were no more sounds of collapsing. The young man gulped in the thought of what could possibly be causing this phenomenon.

Upon arriving at the Center proper and entering it, Vero was welcomed with the unnerving sight of several people inside, some sitting along the wall, others clinging to the counter, and the rest staying in some other position, but immobile nonetheless. The only exception was a black-haired, white-wearing, and rather muscular girl who was currently discussing with the Nurse.

"Hey, excuse me, but could someone tell me what's happening here?" He said, pulling several of the refugees inside out of their reverie. The girl and the Nurse turned to him, and Vero recognised the trainer who had helped him out against the gang.

"Oh, hi, umm…" The dark-skinned girl said, snapping her fingers in her attempt to remember his name. "Vero, was it?" After a quick nod from the addressee, she continued, with a worried look. "Well, if you hadn't noticed coming here, the Ward is getting pretty fucked up right now. These people are hiding, and I was trying to convince them to try to get out of here."

"Shouldn't be too difficult, honestly…" Vero said, bringing his fingers to his chin as he reflected upon the situation. "I didn't have much problems coming over here, so it can't be that bad to go back. Besides, I was told the Ward was getting under quarantine, so if anyone wants to get out, it's now…" He looked at the various people who were standing around, and some of them were beginning to move over to the exit. Vero and the girl then got outside along the few who had gathered the courage to do so.

Once outside, the black haired woman passed her hand through her hair while breathing in what she probably expected to be fresh air, but instead she got an extra portion of dust and smoke in her lungs. After a few strong coughs, she brought her shirt to her nose's level in order to try to filtrate the particles in the air – it wouldn't be nearly as effective as even a regular, cheap mask, but it was still something. As they were moving to the main road, she turned to Vero and a smile appeared on her face.

"Well, I have to say, for someone who struggled against a mere group of thugs just yesterday, to come here and face the dangers of whatever is going on here, you've grown some balls…"

"I had been travelling for an hour when you saw me." Vero replied, with an unamused expression on his face. "I've gotten way better by now." He then looked back at her with a curious expression. "Could you tell me your name, again?"

"Lucia, happy to meet you… again." She said with a wider smile. Once the group arrived at the intersection, Vero noticed that Lucia was not going with the rest, towards the Great Hall.

"Hey, where the hell are you going?" He called out to her as she went in the same direction as Florinia did earlier. She turned around with and indignant expression on her face.

"Well, I've come here for some… unfinished business before the vines attacked. I only had one place to go through."

"Which is..?" Vero asked back, lifting an eyebrow and tilting his head.

"The slums. I'm not gonna be there for long. You? Where are you going?"

"I was supposed to make some research or something about what is happening, but seeing how it evolves, I think I should go back with Florinia. She went past that shop, there…" He then pointed at what now amounted as a dense pile of vegetal, which almost cut the road in half.

"Well, the slums are in more or less the same direction. You comin'?" She rapidly tilted her head in the direction of the mass and back. Vero, for his part, shrugged his shoulders.

"Yeah, sure. Just be careful."

As the duo was going through the main street and nearly arrived at the park where the worst of the commotion was happening, Lucia turned to Vero and offered her hand before adopting an overly uptight posture.

"Well, it was nice to see you in better circumstances – and mood –, but now we have to part ways. And hey, if we-"

Unfortunately, she didn't get the chance to finish her sentence. Shortly after the beginning of her speech, the mass of tentacles had begun moving erratically and some particularly large parts of it were smashing the asphalt. The two trainers watched, unable to change anything to it, as it slowly cracked the road. Eventually, the entire width of the road collapsed, forming a meters-wide crevasse right between them and where Vero had been intending to go. The latter's arms became sloppy as he observed the situation unfold, speechless.

After a minute or so, loud noise that sounded like a battle could be heard from afar. Both trainers, however, couldn't see any of it. Lucia stood alongside Vero for a few more seconds, before an idea crossed her mind.

"Hey, you know what we could do?" The young man turned to her, a defeated yet curious look on his face. "I've heard that the slums are stupidly dangerous and you need to get over to the other side, right?" Her interlocutor acquiesced, prompting her to continue.

"So, here's what we do: We go together in there, I do my stuff and I help you find a way to the other side while I'm at it. Doesn't that sound great?"

Calling it 'great' was a bit of an overstatement, Vero thought. Maybe a more appropriate term would be 'convenient'. Nevertheless, he admitted that it was a good idea.

"Alright, let's do it. I bet we will be done by the evening, at least."

"Well, maybe not. I have to search for… _someone_…"

'_Well, shit, then.'_ He thought.

As the pair began walking towards the part of the city known as the 'slums', Vero and Lucia stayed in silence as they observed the buildings that they were approaching. Strangely, this place, which was pretty much mostly in shambles, seemed untouched by the overly violent plant invasion. It looked a little bit like the place he had slept in last night, but extended to an entire neighborhood. Before arriving at a pretty narrow street, Lucia stopped him with a hand on the shoulder.

"Hey, just be cautious, alright? There are a lot of crazy stuff going on in there, I heard…" Vero slightly frowned.

"Can't be worse than whatever is wrecking Obsydia. Besides, why are you so adamant to go in there? What is possibly worth that much?"

Realising that '500 bucks' would seem a bit shallow, Lucia hesitated a little while biting her lower lip, which didn't go unnoticed by Vero.

"A very rare Pokémon, it was stolen from me."

"Hmm-hmph…" Vero didn't seem particularly impressed by her claim. "And what is it?"

"Uhh… I'll tell you once we get it, okay? Wouldn't want to ruin the surprise, would you?" Her addressee sighed in response and prepared to move on forward, or at least that's what he intended to do before a feminine voice called to both of them.

"Watch out! Where are you going?"

Surprised, Vero turned around and glanced in the direction of the one who had just yelled at both of them. When he saw the long, thick black hair, and the baggy kimono, Vero had already guessed who had spoken.

"Victoria?" He asked, relaxing his posture and turning his entire body into her direction. Lucia, for her part, only looked between the two in confusion.

"Oh, hey! Didn't think it was you… but anyway, why are you two going over there?" She then designated the slums with her index, with a look of puzzlement on her face.

"Well, Lucia here needed to check something out and I needed to get to the other side of the Ward without vines getting in the way and destroying the road. How did _you_ get here, anyway?"

"Kiki pulled some strings, so I can help out with the current problem…" Vero thought that he would have to ask who this 'Kiki' is that she keeps referring to. Lucia then took a step forward.

"Are you going to help us out or something like that?"

"No, I won't. I have to try to find survivors in Obsydia before the sprouts destroy everything." She then looked back, staring worryingly at the giant plants that continued to grow. "However, I won't let you enter this place without making sure you're not going to get hurt."

"What?" Vero replied dryly, a serious frown appearing over his eyes. "And who are you now to try to tell me I can't go somewhere?"

"To be fair, dude, you-" Lucia began speaking with an index in the air, but she was interrupted by Vero.

"Doesn't count." The young man pouted slightly while his current companion snickered. "Sorry, what do you mean by 'making sure'?" He tried to keep a calmer expression, but his frustration was still obvious to every observer present.

"I was thinking about a quick battle. What did you think?" Victoria took a curious tone as she continued. "You _do_ have a revenge to take, don't you?"

Vero's face suddenly went from irritation to excitement. Now, she was speaking his language!

"You bet I do. Okay, one-on-one, our starters, what do you think?"

"It's perfect!" Victoria smiled cheerfully as she prepared her starter Pokémon's Ball.

Lucia, who had been watching the exchange go on, shrugged and went to the walk path at the side of the road in order to witness the battle that the two were about to get into. At the same time, it would allow her to judge her temporary travelling partner's skills.

Vero grabbed one of his Pokéballs and, as per standard procedure, released his Charmeleon.

"Buddy, time for payback!"

The reptile then bursted out of his Pokéball, roaring all the way before he landed. Vero noticed that Buddy's attitude had changed quite a bit. Before his evolution, he was mostly quiet and even in battle, he was rather calm. Now, however, he seemed to have taken several levels in pride.

As the Charmeleon wiped the floor with his flaming tail, Victoria sent her own fighter in the fray.

"Go, Fireball."

Vero then saw that the Litten he had previously fought had evolved as well in-between their two battles, becoming a Torracat. He grimaced slightly, since it meant that her Pokémon had now became even faster. However, he himself had way more tricks up his sleeve.

Lucia then stood up and approached the improvised battlefield, becoming a sort of de-facto referee.

"Okay, so now, the match is on! Do your best!"

As soon as Lucia said these words, both trainers came with their orders.

"Fireball, use Double Kick!"

"Buddy, Smoke Screen!"

Thus, before the feline could actually get its first hit in, the field was too darkened for it to aim properly and made it miss its target. Vero smiled seeing this. It may be a bit boring to always open with the same attack, but its benefits were undeniable. Plus, since she had already defeated him in a previous fight, he decided that he would go all-out.

"Now, use Dragon Rage!"

Buddy then threw his blue flames in the direction of the Torracat. However, its reflexes were sharp and it jumped out of the way. In the air, it took notice of Buddy's location and the bell at its neck began to glow.

"Fireball, chase after Charmeleon!"

The much-faster mammal had no problem obeying its mistress' orders, harassing Buddy with its claws bared. When the Charmeleon tried to counter-attack with his own, he found out that the opponent had the strength advantage and, having forgotten about how to use Growl, he couldn't bring it to his favor. Instead, his trainer had another idea of how to turn the tables. Once the two Pokémon briefly clashed again, Vero yelled.

"Smoke Screen, now!"

Buddy obeyed immediately and, with the face of his foe just in front of him, he basically spitted his smoke right in its face. Recoiling back both from shock and disgust, Victoria's Torracat began to cough with a pained expression, while also clenching its eyes shut, no doubt due to the irritating substance it had just received in them.

Satisfied with his dirty tactic and seeing his opponent vulnerable, Vero took the chance he had served himself on a silver plate.

"Now, Dragon Rage, again!"

Still in the middle of its coughing fit, the feline forced an eye open in order to see what was happening, and it could only see a blue torrent coming right in its way. Obviously, it was in no condition to dodge nor fight back, so it merely took the blast and found itself projected a few meters away. Not wanting to overuse the attack and tire out his Pokémon, Vero ordered:

"Now, slash it up!"

Buddy then sported a grin as he threw himself at his opponent. Unfortunately for the former, the latter had regained enough composure to evade the attacks.

Vero noticed that now, Victoria was playing it safe, telling Fireball to wait out of Buddy physical range and probably waiting for him to use a long-ranged one in order to get close and sneak a hit. While he knew this, he also knew that trying to chase it down wouldn't result in a pretty situation for his Charmeleon. Thus, he opted for the tactic that was slightly less likely to backfire: Ember.

Buddy began sending his flames in the Torracat's direction, but it was way too agile to be hit from this distance. Vero couldn't afford to stay stationary.

"Go after it, Buddy, and use Ember!"

Since Fireball still had the strength advantage, Vero figured that the best bet for now was to get just close enough to make the Ember attacks work, but too far for the feline to use its own physical moves.

What he hadn't accounted for, however, was that Victoria would give an order too, one that took his plan and figuratively threw it in the garbage.

"Jump on your foe, use Scratch!"

After a missed Ember from Buddy, Fireball sprung from the ground and clung on his head as it began throwing around vicious strikes with its claws. Fortunately, Buddy was quick enough to react and threw himself on his back, hitting the Torracat against the hard ground.

After letting out a groan of pain, Fireball got up and tried to repeat its tactic, but backed off quickly when a dark smoke began to steam out of Buddy's mouth. The Flame Pokémon then covered the battlefield in thick darkness, making it hard for Fireball to see. Victoria had it jump into the air to locate the Charmeleon again, but this time, Vero was prepared. As soon as the cat was visible over the cloud of smoke…

"Dragon Rage now!"

The Torracat's eyes widened as the characteristic cyan flames of the attack were propelled towards it and, since it was in the air, it had no way of dodging it. However, it did manage to lessen the blow with an Ember attack. When it landed on the ground, however, it was definitively not in a good shape, and Vero thought that it would be a good time to finish the fight right there and then. Making Buddy use Scratch, he watched as the Charmeleon charged towards the almost downed Torracat.

However, his foe wasn't exactly done for, and Victoria had it use a last ditch strategy.

"Use Fire Fang! Don't let it touch you!"

And, following the commands, Fireball jumped right at Buddy and bit him right at the neck, its burning fangs injuring Buddy pretty badly. Then, when the lizard almost managed to free itself, Fireball used Ember at point-blank range. Buddy found himself propelled several feet away, and both Pokémon fell to the ground hard, exhausted by the match.

When neither of them seemed to be able to get up, Lucia raised her hand and whistled impressively loudly.

"Both Pokémon are down, the fight is thus a draw!" She then lowered her hand and questioned her own judgement. "But Fireball was the one to deal the last blow, so did it win? But Buddy there dealt the hit that downed Fireball first, so would it mean that-"

"I'll settle for a draw, for now." Vero said flatly, not without a hint of frustration in his voice. Lucia shrugged and reiterated her former verdict. Victoria then went to Vero and bowed to him, which Vero awkwardly reproduced.

"I must say, your Charmeleon is way better than when we first fought. Your Smoke Screen and Dragon Rage are pretty strong…" The young man, obviously, couldn't help but smile proudly. "However, you are still prone to losing your focus when you think you've won. I would have lost if you simply threw another Rage instead of attempting a personal finishing." At _this_, however, Vero's smile faded just a little bit.

After all of the commotion was over, Victoria brought back her Torracat while Vero and Lucia healed Buddy with the girl's more effective medicine. Then, the pair went to Victoria.

"Well, I guess it proves that you will be good enough for the slums, then. I wish you good luck."

"Yeah, same, girl. Just be real careful when you get out in Obsydia. I don't know what's going on, but it's pretty darn crazy."

"Indeed…"

After this little exchange, Victoria bowed once again, a gesture which Lucia reciprocated with much more grace than her male companion. Once the girl in kimono was gone, Lucia turned to Vero with a playful smile.

"So, you like this girl, don't you?"

"… What?" Vero's confused expression then turned into one of embarrassment as he understood the full implication of what she said. "She's my rival, that's all we are. She beat me once, and now I have yet to defeat her fully in combat."

"Yeah, sure… You totally have a tsundere-style crush on her…" She then proceeded to slightly extrude her lips while taking a mocking tone. "_Oh, Victoria, I want to fight you, not because I like you or anything…_" She quickly stopped, though, once she noticed that her interlocutor had already departed to the slums without her. She then ran after him for a few meters.

"Aw, come on, don't be like that! I'm just teasing you!"

"Well, don't, okay?" He said, visibly frustrated. Lucia also noticed that he was pouting. "Is there anything else you want to say?"

"Alright, then, what about we talk of our lives? Family, friends, funny anecdotes?"

"No."

The flat tone with which the young man had retorted made Lucia flinch a little. She sighed, wondering how she would deal with such a guy for the next hours.

"Well, maybe except the anecdotes. I have some of them."

Then, as she looked to Vero again, his face had relaxed a little. _'See? Just needed to calm down'_, she thought, before smiling once again. Now, at least, they were getting somewhere.


	14. Vero and Lucia: The slums (part 2)

Day 2, 15:00

As the two young trainers approached the deteriorated buildings of which the slums were consisted of, Vero took the time to observe his surroundings, in search of anything suspicious. After all, if he didn't want to find himself cornered once again, he would need to be aware of where an enemy could jump from.

Lucia, meanwhile, was still looking rather relaxed, but she was also checking out for anything of interest. However, unlike Vero who was concerned for his safety, she was looking for anything that seemed like it would steal a rare Pokémon.

Soon enough, the pair arrived at a dead-end, where piles of trash and various unsafe-looking syringes were scattered around. Vero looked at his companion; she had her hands on his hips, trying to find a way to the eastern part of Obsydia.

"So… maybe we can pass over it? If we use some trash to serve as a ladder, we could get to the roofs." She stated, reflecting intensly.

"Hardly. These 'roofs' will collapse as soon as we arrive on them. I think it would be better to try to find another way in the open." At this, Lucia chuckled a little.

"I don't think there are much more streets around here, dude. Instead, we – HEY! Look! There's an opening over there!"

Then, she grabbed Vero's face with her left hand and turned it in the same direction as her own as her right hand was pointing towards an old building of which a wall plank had been removed. Her companion of fortune grimaced, both from the unexpectedly strong grip of her hand and the idea of entering a shady, crumbling shack.

Before he could protest, however, Lucia sprinted to the small gap in the worn out wall. Jumping on some debris, no doubt coming from the remains of old buildings, the dark-haired girl arrived to the opening with next to no issue. She used one of her hands to hang on the plank that was still shakily attached to the rest of the edifice while using her free one to signal to Vero to follow her.

The young man, sighing loudly, let out his Sparky, just in case there was some threat waiting for them. As its master struggled to keep his balance on the broken concrete and the bricks, the little Joltik quickly bounced from step to step until it had rejoined Lucia. When Vero caught up with the two others, the young woman was looking at him with some not-so-well disguised disappointment.

"You know, you would really benefit from putting yourself in shape. You don't really give off an impression of a 'strong guy' when you can barely jump a few times…" Her interlocutor then frowned and crossed his arms.

"If you will excuse me, I have passed a pretty tiresome day so far. I've beaten a Gym Leader, this morning, so don't try to make me doubt my skills!"

"Hey, I didn't…" Lucia tried to clarify her intentions, but she was cut off by Vero.

"And even if I didn't look 'strong'…" He performed the apostrophe symbol with his fingers to emphasize his point. "… Then, it's even better, because my foes will underestimate me! In other words, my body is my business."

The two then entered a staring contest, none of them being willing to break off eye contact anytime soon. Sparky, still out of its ball, looked nervously between the two trainers, not sure if it should intervene or not. The stare off was broken, however, when a cracking noise could be heard from further down the shack. Both Vero and Lucia glanced in its direction, before they agreed non-verbally to keep on moving.

Advancing tediously, on floors with a good chunk of it missing and the rest threatening to break down every time one of the two trainers stepped on the either too dry or overly damped wood, Vero and Lucia travelled from small room to another, through passages that were probably not present when the building was functional. At around the fourth or the fifth small room they found themselves in, a lot of boxes were scattered around the place. Vero wouldn't admit it, but the place was creeping him out.

"You know…" Lucia whispered. "Maybe taking the time to search for that kid would not be such a good idea after all…"

"No freaking shit…" Retorted Vero, who was having quite the cold sweat right now. "Why would a kid even be hanging around, anyway?"

The girl then lowered her head, realising her short-sightedness. She then looked around, observing the boxes that were all around the room. When she looked behind her, however, there was one in particular that caught her attention.

By all appearances, it was a pretty regular box, made of cardboard like all the others. It had the same motifs on it than the others, and it also shared the same size. There was something, however, that wasn't quite right for Lucia: _it was right in front of the opening they went through to enter the place. _There wasn't any other around it either.

"Vero..?" She then nudged him a bit with her arm, causing him to glance at her with a little bit of worry. "This thing… was it there, before?"

"I don't think so. Can't have moved on its own, though. Unless…" He brought his hand to his chin as he thought about the – admittedly few – different explanations for this phenomenon.

"Unless what?" His companion said, tilting her head towards him as she waited for an answer.

Just as he was about to speak his mind, however, a sharp screech could be heard from the box, which made both Lucia, Vero and Sparky jump in fear, before it suddenly seemed to slide on the floor towards an exit that the pair hadn't been through yet. Both of them stood in shock before the young man regained his composure and took a heavy breath in.

"Unless it was a Pokémon who moved it. I guess my hypothesis was correct." He crossed his arms, nodding, while Lucia was busy regaining control of her breathing rhythm.

"And what do we do, with your hypoposi… something?" She asked, looking in the direction that the box went to.

"Well, I will need something else than just a Charmeleon and a Joltik to defeat the next Leader I face. Especially if they decide to use stronger teams, since I have a badge already. Thus, I must catch something else before my next Gym battle."

"Oh, I see. Well then, what are we waiting for?"

"Wait a little second, Lucia…" The dark-skinned girl stopped right in her tracks, looking at Vero with a mix of confusion and curiosity. "Could you show me what kind of Pokémon you use?" Her face seemed to lit up in an instant as she reached inside of her bag.

After a little shuffling through to find what she wanted, she released her first Pokémon. It was a Monferno, presumably evolved from a starter Chimchar. It stretched a little upon its release. The second one was a little Noibat, which immediately began hovering around its trainer while emitting weak squeaks. The third, and last one, was a Klink. The little gear-like Pokémon was floating close to the ground and occasionally its turning was seemingly interrupted by some kind of jamming.

Vero nodded his head at the little collection she had. He figured that the Noibat had been caught in some dark and humid place in Peridot and for the Klink… well, he would have to demand some explanations on this one. Outside of Unova, it was a pretty rare Pokémon.

"You know…" He began, sporting a pensive expression. "Noibats usually use echolocation to direct themselves. Why wouldn't you tell it to help us navigate through here?"

"… What again?" Asked Lucia in return with a look of confusion. Vero sighed.

"They use sound to see better. It's pretty dark here and it looks like it's going to be a true maze from start to finish."

"Yeah, okay, but…" She began to scratch her head as she evaluated Vero's proposal.

"Would it really help us? It's not like she can talk. I don't really think she could recognize to three rooms ahead, anyway."

After sighing another time, Vero merely went in the direction of the rogue box, leaving Lucia to return her Pokémon and running after him. As they advanced, they had to continue to be wary of fragile footing and hazardous waste. Vero's worry about the place being a labyrinth gradually became moot, as there was pretty much only one path on which one could travel with relative safety.

As the two advanced, they eventually stumbled into what looked like a quite narrow corridor, with most of the doors locked. Arriving at the end of it, they arrived in a pretty spacious room, where there were rather large stairs. Most importantly, however, was the _little box_ in the middle of it. The two trainers looked at each other and approached it, but once they came close, it did the same thing as the first time they saw it and it quickly sled to a narrow opening at the base of a wall.

As Vero mentally cursed the missed opportunity, a voice suddenly came from the shadows of the room, spooking both him and Lucia.

"These… these are alive…" Turning his head, Vero saw that it was a quite tired-looking young man. He was unshaved and seemed quite stunned. Vero assumed that he was probably under the influence of some drug.

"Sometimes, I talk to the box… and sometimes they talk back." As he continued on, Vero readied himself to keep following the mysterious Pokémon, but Lucia had another idea.

"And what do they say?" Her companion stopped right where he was and looked at her, with a mix of disapprobation and worry. The young man, for his part, seemed quite surprised to get a response. He looked at the young woman in the eyes and elaborated with a certain numbness on his lips.

"They don't really say stuff… normally, they just yell at me… but they go away after… yelling."

After he made such colossal efforts into articulating his last sentence, he rested his head on the wall behind him and closed his eyes, mumbling some sort of song. Seeing him in such a deplorable state, Lucia frowned and came over to him.

"Lucia… what are you doing?" Asked Vero with his eyes on the downed man.

"Well, I'm taking him out. If he stays here and the plants attack the slums, he's done." The young woman said with conviction. Vero then looked at the young man and sighed.

"Alright, I know where you come from, but it's not the best idea to just carry him around."

"And… why not?" Lucia responded, crossing her arms.

"Just… imagine waking up, and you find yourself being brought to a place you don't know by two people you don't know. How would you react?"

Lucia's mood then went down a little, while Vero decided not to outright say that he didn't trust this guy not to rob or kill them in their sleep. The young woman then pouted and tapped her foot on the ground a few times. Then, her eyes seemed to lit up and she reached into her bag. Once she got it out, Vero was a little surprised to see it holding a wrapped sandwich.

She then kneed down next to the snoring young man and carefully deposited the small meal in between his arm and his torso. She then got up and turned to Vero, who was standing motionless and glancing at her in an emotionless expression, lost in thoughts.

"What? He's probably going to be hungry once he wakes up, right?" She asked with a lifted eyebrow.

"Oh, no, it is good. Let's just go on our way." The young man said, returning to reality.

'_Maybe before swarming the region with trainers, Reborn should have taken care of their own problems first.'_ He thought.

At this point, the pair now had to go through the small gap in the wall. While both of them were thin enough to pass, they had to crawl and remove their bigger clothing first. In Vero's case, he had to get rid of his dark jacket for a few seconds and for Lucia's, it was her white furry coat. Fortunately, she had a simple dark undershirt to cover her torso and abdomen. Besides a small piece of Vero's shirt's left sleeve, the passage went without any big loss.

At the other side of the broken wall, there was yet another dark room, full of waste. There wasn't any furniture, but there _was_ another opening, from which a lot of light came from, indicating that it was an exit. _Finally_, thought the two trainers.

Once they arrived outside, however, they found themselves on the roof of one of the many buildings from which the extensions that are now known as the slums were constructed from. As a result, this particular rooftop, which was actually covered in tar, was much sturdier than the average of the other ones in the area.

As Vero, Lucia and her charge moved on to the next entrance of a nearby building, Vero took a look in the direction of the Obsydia Ward. While he didn't initially have an idea of where it was, the rumbling sound of the ravaging plants gave him a pretty good hint. Even though they were probably on the third or fourth floor, the demonic sprouts were visible from their position, twirling and twisting upwards. Some, having become too heavy to keep themselves upright, came back down crashing into the surrounding area. Fortunately, Lucia's worry about the catastrophe coming to them did not seem as though it would actually happen, as the plants didn't look to be approaching.

After entering the next ruined shack, to their surprise, the two trainers saw a man, dressed in a white coat – although to Vero, it looked more like a smock. His back was resting on a wall as he scribbled something on a note paper. As the pair came closer, the older man seemed to hear them walk towards him and glanced at them. His eyes then widened, as he stood motionless. Vero wondered why he was glaring at them, until the guy merely went back to his scribblings.

Realising that he was probably not going to acknowledge them, Vero merely shrugged and got ready to go on. When Lucia passed by him, however, she leaned over to him and asked with a curious expression.

"Hey, what's this all about, science guy?"

Surprised by the casualness of the young woman, the older man lifted his eyes from his paper, before sighing and adjusting his glasses.

"If that's all you want to know, I am studying the gang of Pokémon that operates in the slums." Hearing this, Vero perked up and turned around.

"A gang, you said?"

"Yes. A group of wild Pokémon, directed by a pretty powerful one. I have no confirmation of their particular species, as they always travel hidden, but I have reasons to think that their leader is a Scrafty, if the screeches I hear are any indication."

"Huh. That would be interesting to verify." Vero thought out loud. "Well, later, we're on our way, right Lucia?"

"Do whatever you have to, younglings, and we've never met. You can trust me…"

The young woman simply nodded and followed him further down the slums. After their brief meeting with the scientist, the duo continued their travel without much incidents, besides the numerous instances where they had to find alternate paths, due to a collapsed floor or something of the same vein.

After some time, Lucia began to feel that she was becoming more and more tired and, looking at her Pokégear, she saw that it was already over 20:00. The two then settled on a seemingly safe room. There was only one difficult access to it, and there was a lot of piping, indicating that there may have been a water heater here in the past.

As Vero sat along the wall and released his two Pokémon, Lucia stretched and yawned before doing the same. Laying down, she brought both of her hands behind the back of her head and sighed in relief. Vero, after petting Sparky and amusing Buddy by moving around a broken piece of wood, Vero turned to his female companion and paid a particular attention to her expensive-looking attire, especially her coat and her boots. Both were, currently, covered in dirt and dust, no doubt permanently staining them without extensive cleaning.

"Lucia?"

"Hmm?" Answered the young woman, weakly opening an eye.

"Where do your clothes come from, exactly? You don't seem afraid to stain them?" Lucia closed her eye again, with her Monferno toying with one of her locks of hair.

"Oh, well… it was a gift before I came here. A big waste, already, so I figured I would just use it as I saw fit… in other words, I don't really care what happens to it, it wasn't _me_ who thought it was a good idea to give priceless stuff to someone who would travel a lot, right?"

Blinking a few times to process the unusual logic, Vero ended up merely shrugging and returning to attending to his Pokémon partners. That is, until the girl addressed him back, already half-sleepy.

"And, uhh… How did you end up assisting in Obsydia, anyway? What did you do?"

"Oh, that… In short, I ended up helping the Gym Leaders fighting against the people who bombed the train station. Then, I've beaten Julia, she sent me to Florinia, and… the rest is history."

"Huh… like I said… not bad… Anyway, sleep well. Have a good night."

As Lucia sank further and further into her slumber, Vero decided to stay awake a little bit, instead, in order to make sure that they weren't going to be attacked. So far, he appreciated the girl, but her periodical lack of judgement baffled him.

On one hand, to help him make vigil was the flame of Buddy, keeping the place somewhat illuminated. On the other, the warm and reassuring dance of the shadows of the room created by it only made him to sleep even more himself. In order not to, he ordered Sparky to shock him once in a while to force his brain to stay awake. It probably wasn't good for his health, but as far as he knew, they were in a pretty crappy situation right now.

Eventually, though, even the Joltik's 'therapy' proved itself insufficient for curing Vero's tiredness, and the young man slowly closed his eyes, for what would probably be a short rest.


	15. Alice and Ari: Crisis at Jasper

Day 2, 15:30

Alice's mind was, at the moment, entirely focused on trying to get the hell out of this damned forest. Shortly after their little sprint, Ari's head injury had come to bite her as a raging headache suddenly manifested itself on the poor girl, because of the physical strain and the intense stress they were both under.

She could barely speak right now in more than a few successive words, and there was no indication that it was going to be better any time soon. In fact, Alice had to support her over her shoulder to try to get as far as possible.

Without this Gallade and its trainer, they would have been caught without doubt – like hell she would abandon her friend – and, given that this was a group with mostly no qualms about organising mass murders… well, let's just say that Alice didn't believe their life expectancy wouldn't have been great if it had been the case.

For now, she was beginning to see the clearance of the woods as she was trying not to trip on a root for the fifth time. Ari, meanwhile, was doing her best to move forward as her friend was holding her. Her head felt as if a hammer was pounding from the inside.

Once they arrived at the Ward, a passerby took notice of them and promptly went to the two girls in distress. After Alice explained that Ari needed medical attention, the stranger began to help support the ebony blonde as they went to the nearest hospital. The problem, however, was that there wasn't one in Jasper. Indeed, the place was quite small in matters of surface and population alike, so the ones situated in Beryl, at the north, and Peridot, at the south, were generally sufficient.

As they were moving to the stairs connecting Jasper and Peridot, though, something odd began to happen.

The two girls and the man stopped moving as the ground began to shake. Ari, who in her current state couldn't fully grasp the situation, fell to her knees as she wondered – not without difficulty – why they had halted. The man and Alice's eyes widened in horror as they believed they had come to the correct conclusion. All around them, other civilians were rushing to somewhere relatively safe as well.

"An earthquake! Quick, get as far from the buildings as possible!" Yelled the older man, as he grabbed both Alice and Ari and brought her in the middle of the road, where she would be less likely to receive debris. What happened next, however, took all of them by surprise.

Suddenly, the tarmac around them had begun to fissure, which the trio didn't take as something weird as first, but when it began to extrude upwards, then Alice's attention found itself attracted to the nearest crack. Then, with an unexpected vivacity, giant sprouts suddenly emerged from the ground all around the three people, pointing towards the sky as they grew unnaturally quickly and became quite thick as well, rapidly getting as large as fully grown trees in a matter of seconds.

Finally realising what was going on, Ari clutched on Alice. Her friend, for her part, wasn't sure of what to do. If they moved, then they risked being crushed under a falling building, but if they didn't, they may get hurt by one of those weird plants…

Her train of thought was suddenly interrupted, however. One of the plants, having seemingly become too big to support its own size and weight, was crashing down towards them. Grabbing her friend, Alice barely had the time to jump sideways as the man only now realised the danger he was in and screamed. The enormous sprout landed on the ground, utterly destroying the road under it, the cry stopping right at the same time.

As she looked behind her in horror, the Goth was paralysed by the shock and her fear, unable to perform any movement, as Ari tried to get up by herself and drag her along, despite her state.

"RUN! RUN!"

The two heard a voice coming from the direction of the Malchous forest, but neither of them actually had the time to see who was speaking specifically nor perform any kind of meaningful action before a second plant came crashing towards them.

"MERCURY! NIGHT SLASH!"

As the two young women held to each other, however, Alice vaguely saw a dark blur passing by them, then jumping in the direction of the sprout. With a gigantic cutting attack, the latter was neatly split in two and Alice and Ari found themselves standing in the middle of the two halves as they hit the ground. The crash made the ground rumble around them, causing Alice to fall over.

As Ari looked up, she could briefly see an Absol, like the one she and that boy from the train had seen in the desert, standing beside them, looking around nervously. She thought that it must have sensed the tragedy coming, and was a more proactive specimen than the average Absol, until a young… _person_ came in view, and Ari realised that it was the trainer who had already saved their lives before. The white-haired trainer stood above them, as the chaos roared behind them. The face was hard as stone and their eyes cold. They then extended a hand to the two trainers.

"Come with me, if you want to live."

After Ari accepted their hand, the Absol then nudged Alice to snap her out of her stupor. The white-haired trainer then quickly brought them to the Police Station of Jasper, which was near the access between this Ward and Peridot, and they saluted the two girls with a sad smile on their face before rushing back into the raging vegetal attack, their Absol closely following them. Alice also saw their Gallade cutting up certain roots before they became too big. This proved to be futile efforts, however, since it would simply regrow in next to no time at all. As a result, it quickly joined its trainer in rescuing people.

The few policemen who were still present brought the two girls inside, then proceeded to go outside to try and assist the darkly-clothed trainer. One of them, however, stayed to take care of Ari, whose adrenaline level had gone down and, as a result, felt her headache at full power once again. Alice, for her part, decided to go see if she could help in any way, shape or form. When she went outside, however, she found out that the gigantic sprouts were still ravaging buildings and roads left and right. The silver lining was that they seemed to slow down ever so slightly.

As if to crush this tiny hope spot, a three stories tall apartment complex crumbled right in her line of sight. This, Alice could not stomach. She rushed at the debris in order to find as many survivors as possible. Nothing could fall on her if it was already fallen, right?

As she approached the new ruins, Alice released her Buneary, Clumsy, in order to help her move the wreckage out of the way. Despite her small size, the little Pokémon was quite strong, and it was able to move things around with more ease than her skinny master.

Eventually, the two managed to find body. It was a little girl, who was stuck on her bed, under her collapsed roof. What worried Alice, however, was the fact that she wasn't moving at all. When she moved another piece of ceiling in order to liberate her head, her face twisted into an expression of pure terror as she violently turned away and brought both hands to her stomach.

What she had failed to consider before trying to free the girl, was that she didn't have the time to get to safety – or she didn't know how to – when the earthquake hit. As a result, she was completely unprotected when a story high of material came crashing on her. While her body was in relative good shape, her head was not. It had been bashed in by a heavy piece of furniture, leaving her eyes, brains and what was once without doubt a wonderful little visage was now in conditions that are better left unsaid.

After barely resisting the urge of vomiting away on the debris she was currently on, Alice took a few seconds to regain a steady breathing before she was forced to move by her Buneary and a menacing sprout which had erupted nearby. As she retreated back to the Police Station, a loud, blaring noise made Alice jump in surprise and she turned around, seeing a few chunks of a big sprout flying around as a cloud of smoke elevated into the sky. She could only guess that the battle between man and plant was getting harder.

Once she arrived at the station, she immediately went for Ari, who was still with the officer who stayed behind. He was a fairly short man, under five feet and 6 inches. He had blue eyes and a blonde, shortly cut beard. He noticed her coming back in thanks to his Growlithe who barked a few times upon seeing her.

"Oh, it's you again…" He then handed Ari a bag of ice for her head before getting up and sighing. "I get that you want to help, but I think it's best if you at least try to wait until the chaos calms down. We don't even know what's going on. Trust me, it could get very ugly at any time."

Alice merely nodded a little as the policeman called his little Pokémon, who happily followed him outside. She then sat down next to Ari, worried.

When would it be safe to go back to Peridot? Was it alright to leave without trying to help more? Did she _want_ to see another crushed victim?

The most boggling question, however, was _why_.

_Why_ did these people do this?

_Why_ were they trying to kill people?

_Why_ was _she_ involved in all this?

Right now, all she wanted to do was to go home and melt in the embrace of her mother, but for now, Ari would do.


	16. Vero and Lucia: The slums (part 3)

Day 3, 5:00

It was pretty early in the morning when Vero began to feel awake once again. As he opened his eyes, he blinked a few times in order to get rid of the morning blur they were afflicted with, then he observed his surroundings, still half-asleep and not entirely aware of his current location. At first, the darkness of the place had surprised him slightly, but as he slowly began to remember just where he was, the feeling of uneasiness faded out of him.

Then, as he stretched and prepared to get up, he heard a few grunts coming from his right. Turning around out of curiosity, he was met with the sight of Lucia performing a few push-ups, without her dirty, white coat. Sparky was perched on her back, seemingly enjoying itself as it went up and down with the girl's early exercising routine, while Buddy was just looking at her with mild intrigue.

"Hey, what are you doing?" Asked Vero, after rubbing his eyes.

"Well… if it wasn't obvious… I'm shaping up…" She responded between her movements. Vero sighed slightly as he clarified.

"Yeah, but I mean, _why_? I mean, aren't we already going to walk a lot?" They young woman laughed a bit at this statement, which made Vero frown in annoyance, before she retorted.

"If you think like that, you're never gonna get in good shape, boy! You gotta pump a little, which shouldn't be so hard…"

"Yeah, whatever…" He then reached through his bag, reaching for his knock-off of a Pokédex, but he pouted a bit when he realised that it couldn't even tell me the time or temperature, like officially-produced ones could. "Hey, you've got the time, just by chance?"

The dark-skinned girl paused for a second, then she let out a loud sigh as she got up, forcing Sparky to get off her in the process. The little bug then sadly looked up before it decided to go jumping around Buddy for entertainment. Lucia took her Pokégear and looked at it with an air of indifference.

"It's five in the morning. Guess you get up early as well." She then went on her knees, intending to resume her exercise.

"Well, since we're both awake, we could begin to move on. We have to get out of this hole."

Just before she was going to start performing her push-ups again, Lucia looked up at him, contemplating the thought.

"Ah, well, I guess that's not a bad idea. Besides, I can always make up for the missed exercises later. Just wait a minute, I'll be ready."

Lucia then proceeded to get up once again, before she went to retrieve the coat she had discarded beside the wall in order to do her push-ups. As she spread her arms to put it back on, Vero noted mentally that she had quite a robust body, with her tight dark shirt revealing her pronounced musculature and her quite firm, even if average-sized at most, bust. Once the coat was back on, it hid those features once more.

After the young man returned his Joltik to its Pokéball, the duo was once again ready to go. After passing through the only narrow exit of the room they were in on fragile wood planks.

As they advanced a bit further, Vero and Lucia arrived at a rather weird room. It was pretty spacious, with a width of easily one hundred feet. Through it, several large, concrete pillars were holding the roof together, though for which reason, Vero didn't know.

For now, the two trainers had to travel through the several alleys created by the pillars. Some passages were jammed with trash, and others had the floor collapsed – a rather common sight in the place, really.

While Vero was carefully proceeding through the impromptu maze that was this room, he failed to take notice of a figure that had sneaked behind him and Lucia, and who now was closing on them.

"Hold it!" They heard, spoken in a quite squeaky voice. When they turned around, they found themselves facing a young man. He was quite small, with a dark blue shirt and damaged shorts. He was posing himself menacingly, holding a knife which he pointed at the pair of trainers. Vero was mostly unimpressed; it wouldn't be the first young idiot to threaten him. "Now, don't try to get your Pokémon or whatever, I warn you!"

"Or what?" Lucia retorted, her eyes burning with a calm fury as she took a step forward. The kid flinched and focused his attention primarily on her. "You… you look like a thief, are you one?"

"Yeah, and so? You can get off your high horses, I'm the one in control here." Vero thought about intervening for an instant, but he thought that it might put someone in danger. Thus, he waited to see how the situation would resolve, but not without bringing a hand to Buddy's Ball.

"You think you scare me with your little toy, kid?" Asked Lucia, advancing further. "Well, then, let me tell you something… _Nobody. Controls. Me. Got it?_" Vero himself took a prudent step backwards as the young woman continued her improvised speech. "Now, you will put that away, and it will be as if we never met, am I clear?"

However, despite Lucia's intention of intimidation, the young man stopped moving backwards and stood his ground, swinging his weapon one time in warning. The young woman interrupted her advancement for the moment, but Vero could see that she was breathing heavily.

"And stealing Pokémon, do you do that too?" She continued, crossing her arms. "You certainly look like it."

Feeling that the tension was soon going to become a bit too much to safely handle, Vero held a hand in front of Lucia as he addressed the young thief.

"Listen, bud. She has had a Pokémon stolen." He stood between the other two, acting as a shield for both of them. "We're not giving you anything, so maybe we can have some kind of trade instead?"

"A-a trade?" Nervously asked the blue shirt-wearing boy, whose hand holding the knife was now trembling. "What kind?"

"If you tell us where her Pokémon is, I won't let her do whatever she has in mind for you." He continued, pointing to the barely composed girl with his thumb. "I don't think you want it, and so do I. Just tell us, and we go on our way, okay?"

The thief seemed to consider the options he had, his eyes altering between looking at Vero and Lucia as he did so. Eventually, he glared at Vero.

"Nothing will happen?"

"Promise."

"Alright…" He then looked at Lucia, who had not moved an inch, but was now staring at Vero's back. "At the Hall, right?" With a rare movement from the young woman, in the form of a nod, he continued. "I took it from the first thief, I thought that 'stealing from a stealer isn't bad', right? Anyway, I don't have it anymore…"

"Go on…" Lucia insisted, relaxing her position.

"I-I sold it to a guy in Lapis… you know, at the north of the Hall? One of the gang members there, I don't remember which in particular, I swear that I don't know more!"

The black-haired woman nodded slowly before her face abandoned her previous expression of frustration and instead came back to her general content look, even though she was still a little less cheerful than usual.

"Well, I guess that's that. Vero, we still have to get out of here, right?"

After acquiescing to her, Vero turned to the young thief and advised him to stop his current ways.

"You'll see, someday, you'll bite a bit more than you can chew. This day, you won't get a chance like we gave to you, okay?"

As they continued to advance, Lucia turned to look behind her one last time, but the boy was already out of sight – and out of hearing, or so she seemed to think.

"Seriously, why do people like him exist? Can't they do anything else than this stuff?" Vero sighed slightly at this question and cleared his throat before answering.

"You know, there isn't always a way. We are never aware of all circumstances."

"Maybe, but this kid still stole my Pokémon and threatened us with a knife. I'm sure someone without money can do something else, even if it's illegal, to get what they want, can't they?"

At this, Vero merely shrugged, in a 'we never know' manner. His interlocutor, on the other hand, remained unconvinced. To her, this boy did not deserve pity.

After a while, the two young trainers arrived at a staircase which only had a way further down, closer to ground level. As they went down, Vero looked at Lucia and asked with impatience:

"How long do you think we still have to go through here? I feel like it's been an eternity…"

"Well, I don't think it should be long, just a feeling."

As they arrived at the bottom of the stairs, though, they found a duo of rather dirty clothed men who were sitting in front of a metal gate, and who didn't really seem to react to the arrival of the two trainers. Lucia approached them, despite Vero's apprehensiveness, and leaned forward as one of the strangers finally looked towards them.

"Hey, hello there, sir! Would you know where the closest exit would be?"

The stranger's fellow then turned to Lucia as well, before the two shared a look and chuckled slightly.

"Well, lady, this would be on the other side of this gate. If you continue forward, you should be out in around five minutes." He then smiled and stretched a little bit. "If you want anything else, just ask!"

"Oh no, we'll be fine! Thank you a lot!" She bowed respectfully before opening the door in the railing, gesturing to Vero to follow her. Hesitant at first, the young man glared at the two ones who were sitting along the wall before rejoining Lucia. "You see what one can gain by just being polite!"

"Yeah, I guess. Just… don't just approach people like that in places like this. These guys looked a bit fishy." The young man retorted, as the two continued advancing.

Eventually, they arrived at a door, embedded in a brick wall. It creaked loudly as Vero pushed it, and he actually had to put in some effort to make it open completely. Once they were into the new room, the pair were shocked by its content.

Boxes. Boxes _everywhere_.

Quite similarly to the first time they had run into such a place, several cardboard boxes were scattered around. There were a lot less, however, and they were all open and upside-down.

"You think there could be wild Pokémon here, too?" Whispered Lucia.

"Maybe. I would rather not find out." Retorted Vero.

The latter opted to walk silently, in order to avoid startling any potentially hidden Pokémon who could be present. While he _did_ want to catch a new one soon in the future, for the moment he only really wanted to get out of this freaking place and back into Obsydia.

After the two trainers had advanced by a few steps forward, the door behind them suddenly slammed close, causing a loud 'bang' which made the pair jump. When they turned around to examine what had actually happened, they saw a small figure on the ground, next to a knocked-aside box. It had a large head, compared to its small size, and it looked as if it was wearing a pair of baggy pants at first glance. Vero, however, recognised this as a Scraggy.

After the first one of them revealed itself, several other Scraggys got out of their thin confinement, screeching. Instinctively, Vero immediately released both his Charmeleon and his Joltik who, taking notice of the presence of several hostile Pokémon in their vicinity, braced themselves for battle. Lucia, for her part, got her Monferno out. The monkey then jump side to side a couple times to try to intimidate their opponents.

As the two trainers and their Pokémon fighters were surrounded, though, some loud noises could be heard from above. Looking up, Lucia noticed a shadowy figure appearing through a large fissure in the ceiling, which soon jumped down, crashing on the ground. In front of the pair was now a rather nasty-looking Scrafty, nodding its bubble-head towards them while screeching, no doubt to order its minions to attack them.

Before the little Scraggys could actually get a hit in, however, Vero had already ordered Sparky to throw its electric string at the leader, forcing it out of the battle for the moment. Lucia, for her part, commanded her starter to attack.

"Iron Fist, get'em with Mach Punch!"

As soon as she uttered these words, the Monferno became nothing but a blur to the wild Pokémon's perspective and knocked several aside. During this time, Buddy was using his Ember technique to distract the rest who had not been hit.

Soon, however, the Scraggys began to direct their attention at the trainers themselves, and tried to attack them. Since Vero was busy fighting the Scafty, Lucia had to take all of the pressure herself. To aid her in this task, she brought in her Noibat and Klink who, while confused at first, quickly reacted to the litteral swarm of Pokémon assaulting them, as certain of their attackers found out the hard way.

"Gear, use Gear Grind!"

The Klink then proceeded to separate itself into its two different pieces before beginning to spin them at great speed and slamming itself into the two nearest foes, sending them crashing to the wall.

Noibat, for its part, had begun shooting its ultrasounds around instead of battling directly, as it was its habit. However, it had difficulty not confusing its own allies, leading Lucia to order it to attack.

While this was going down, Vero was realising that his battle with the wild Scrafty was not going in his favor. Even with the support of Buddy, he wasn't capable of dealing substantial damage to it. Even the Charmeleon's trump card, Dragon Rage, had been dodged endlessly by their enemy. Vero guessed that it may be very experienced and may know when not to tank an attack.

As Buddy tried to use its Ember attack, however, the Scrafty's reaction was to jump head first into the flames, taking it head-on and slamming him into the ground.

Sparky, fortunately, was small enough to avoid getting hit by their much more powerful foe and it was able to land a couple of hits to distract it. When its Thunder Wave finally hit its target, Vero decided that the time would be appropriate to get the hell out of there as fast as possible… hadn't it been for the Monferno who then rushed to the wild gang leader, spinning in fire as it did so, knocking it off its feet.

As he turned around, the young man realised that Lucia had managed to take care of all of the smaller and weaker Scraggys who were harassing her, and thus she was ready to help him defeat the Scrafty.

Bracing itself, the wild Pokémon tried to perform a last attack to the trainers and their teams. In response, Vero ordered Buddy to use Dragon Rage while Lucia commanded her Klink to use Charge Beam. The two attacks connected with their target with ease, knocking it out cold. Vero and Lucia then stood still for a few seconds, breathing heavily as they made sure that their foe was indeed out of commission.

"You think it's down?" Finally asked Lucia, wiping the sweat that had formed on her forehead.

"It probably is. If it isn't, then I suggest getting out. What do you think?"

"Yeah, probably for the better." Lucia said with a sigh of relief.

The pair then recalled all of their companions into their Pokéballs before resuming their travel. Fortunately, apart from telling them that they were falling into a major trap – so much for 'just being polite' –, the two guys at the gate had told them the truth, and after traversing yet another dark room, they managed to find an exit to what looked like a clean enough street.

That is, omitting the clouds of smoke and debris caused by the destruction of the Ward.

As they finally got outside, Vero took the time to look at the sun's position. If his instincts were accurate, then it would be around ten in the morning. If Florinia had needed him before, his help would certainly come off as a bit late, now, Vero thought.

"Well!" Lucia exclaimed, putting her hands on their hips. "This has been quite the adventure. Although if I can help it, I'm never gonna get back there. Like, ever!"

"Yup, same for me…" Vero stated, looking at the street going up north. He frowned and stretched before preparing to follow it. "Alright. I don't know what you plan on doing, but I'm going to finally go get help with the plants up there."

"Wait!" She grabbed his arm, making him wince slightly from the force with which she did so. "You have just battled! Wouldn't you have to heal your Pokémon first?"

Vero's expression then turned blank before he nodded slightly in agreement. The young woman then got her medicine ready as Vero released Buddy and Sparky. She then tended to their bruises, Buddy's in particular, as the two Pokémon relaxed in appreciation of the care given. After she finished healing Buddy, she simply stated:

"I'm done, now. Just be careful. These plants have slowed down, but they're still pretty active." She then looked over at the still-raising sprouts in worry.

"Do not worry for me, I will be fine. Besides, there's a gym leader up there. Where were you going, now that you have found your thief?"

"Well, I have to go to Lapis in order to find my rare Pokémon, so I'll wait until passage is possible without going through the slums again. Ugh…" She brought her hands to her hips again, making the latter move in a circular pattern. "I'm probably going in the Coral Ward, for now." Upon the consequent curious gaze that Vero gave her, she elaborated. "It's a Ward just south from here. It is mostly abandoned due to the pollution in the port, but it will at least be safe from the destruction here. Plus, there was something I wanted to verify. Are you sure you don't want to rest a bit more there before going in danger again? You just spent a day in the slums, so…"

Vero thought about this option for a second. However, when he remembered that Florinia was probably in danger up there, he shook his head and resigned.

"No, I've promised to help, and there is no way in hell that I'll ever back down on a promise."

"Oh, okay. Then, I will get to you whenever I can, alright?" The young man acquiesced to her in response, causing both of them to smile appreciatively.

"Sure. Until then, goodbye." He said, before unceremoniously departing to the north.

"Yeah. Bye…"


	17. Alice and Decibel: Striking Back

Day 3, 5:30

Alice was sitting next to Ari's bed in the station when two patrolling policemen came back to rest. Her injured friend had finally resigned to getting the appropriate period of non-activity that the doctor lady had advised her. As such, she was currently sleeping with a rather peaceful expression on her face. The same could not be said, however, for the man and the woman who had just arrived after several hours of fighting.

"Dear Mother of Arceus, just what are these fucking things?" Asked the man, who had taken a seat near Alice and had lowered his head in discouragement.

"I don't know, Gilles, but apparently, they have the same in Obsydia right now." Responded his partner. The pair's Growlithe was panting quite heavily and came to an automatic water dispenser near the entrance in order to rehydrate itself. "I've also heard that the ones there are slowing in growth rate and the ones here have already begun to as well, so we can contain and destroy them, if we're lucky."

"But we're already lucky! And we're still losing!" Insisted the desperate officer, his partner Pokémon slowly coming to his side in search of affection. "We have lost Tom and Jenny. Gone, without us having any clue of where they are. It's a good thing that this weird Decibel trainer has appeared out of nowhere with his Gallade and Absol, or we would all be dead! And who is he, anyway?" He ended his rant in frustration as he petted his Pokémon, not without some rudeness.

"I… I don't really know, but there was a report of a powerful trainer who used an Absol. I read that they attacked an officer when the latter tried to interrupt a rather intense fight in a populated area." She then sat down next to her partner, cupping her head into her palms. "But you're right, we're lucky they're here."

"Um, excuse me?"

The two policemen then turned their heads around to look at Alice. She had lifted her hand in the air while asking the question, like a student during class.

"How many are you, fighting these things?"

"Oh, without the other two, that makes four still out there, plus the trainer and the Chief." The woman answered, with a tired expression.

"Do… do you want help?" She asked further, causing the two officers to give her looks of surprise.

"I'm… I'm gonna be honest, girl." Began the man, nodding his head slowly. "We could use an extra hand. The thing is that we can barely assure our own safety, so yours is kind of on you for right now."

Alice then looked at the ground with a determined frown, then she looked back up to the policemen.

"Then, I'll help. I have seen the people who did this, and they have also made the train attack. I… I can't let them get away with this and almost killing us twice – thrice, for Ari, and for…"

She winced when the memory of the unfortunate end of the little girl she had tried to get out of the rumble. The policeman then came to her side and put a hand on her shoulder.

"Listen, you can, but it doesn't mean you must. Every civil has evacuated already, and it isn't getting out of Jasper. Heck, it's not destroying all of it either – like here. If you don't want to, then-"

"I said I'm going to. Please, take care of Ari while I'm gone?"

The two officers then acquiesced in order to confirm that they were indeed intending to, with the policewoman giving Alice a thumbs up.

Just as she prepared to get out of the police station, Alice thought about her mother, who had already called her the day before after learning about the whole ordeal in Jasper, much like she did when the train crashed. Back then, she had assured her that she was safe. Now, however, she was going to purposefully throw herself into danger. Despite her overflowing guilt about lying to her mom, she texted her that there was a lockdown and that she couldn't leave the station for now.

Little did she know that the entire Ward she was in was actually in lockdown.

Stepping outside, the morning rays of the rising sun gave to the destruction of the various buildings a bright orange glow, giving the scene a look of an apocalyptic event. Alice had a hard time imagining that the police force had to fight for their lives and others' for the entire night, in almost total darkness, as they were threatened by falling debris and vegetation. A few intersection further, she could see the sprouts twisting as they snatched the asphalt off the ground and sometimes slammed into the nearby walls.

When she began to advance, Alice heard a screech which made her stop in her tracks entirely. Looking up, she saw a rather large bird-like silhouette making a turn in the sky and disappearing behind yet another apartment complex.

Then, a realisation suddenly hit her: How would she help?

After all, if civilians were safe, and even trained officers had trouble with the plants, then what good would a beginning trainer possibly do? She tried to find a way to be useful as she went through the streets, until a distant voice made itself known, which made her flinch again.

"Alright, so where is this little scum?"

As soon as she heard this, she turned around, almost in a panic, in order to identify the owner of the voice. A feeling of relief took her, however, when she distinctively saw a familiar mane of white hair floating into the orange and pink sky.

"Hey, that's not… Ah, whatever. Go back to search, Eon, that's not it yet!"

A cry identical to the one Alice had perceived just a minute ago could be heard again, and as a few metallic sounds filled the eerily silent morning, she saw the unknown bird again, except that this time, she could clearly see that it was a Skarmory that was taking off. Its trainer was standing on a fallen, enormous sprout and was using their hand to hold themselves on the remnants of a wall.

"Sorry, friend! I've ordered her to search for dark-wearing people! Did she scare you?"

"Oh n-no, I was just a lot nervous." Alice responded with her right hand on her chest.

"Then, what are you doing out here so early? It's not as bad as last night, but it's still damn dangerous!"

"I… I wanted to help, somehow." The Goth answered, with a good deal of hesitation.

"Why? Got someone to protect? You have a shop here?" The tone of the androgynous trainer took a more questioning turn.

"I… I almost died because of these people, and they hurt so many already… I have to do something, right?"

A long pause then imposed itself as the two Pokémon trainers looked at each other, with Alice having way less assurance as her interlocutor. After a while, a wide grin appeared on Decibel's face as they got down on the road and approached the gothic blonde.

"So, you want to protect people. Good. I could use some extra hand. Deal with the small fry, all that stuff…" They had begun to list the potential roles that Alice could fill, looking at a random point in the sky as they used their fingers to numerate the possibilities one by one. "Just how good are your Pokémon?"

"Well, my Buneary has been trained for years, my Mincinno for a few mounths, and I just got my Popplio…"

"Great, great… now, how good are you?"

The young woman blinked a few times before hesitantly asking back:

"What do you mean?"

"Well, let's say you have to run after a bad guy, how long do you think you can run before you wrick your ankle? Or how heavy can you lift? Things like this." Decibel was now sporting an expectant look on their face, bringing their hands to their side. Alice, in response, stayed a bit hesitant before responding.

"Uhm, well, I am not much-"

"Ah, don't worry! I'm just messing with you! But seriously, though, we're gonna have to do some pretty intense stuff. Now…" The white-haired trainer then paused as they looked up in the sky. "If Eon can find the grunts and their boss, we may be able to find the source of this mess. But before that, we'll prepare for our raid! Maelstrom!"

At this, they grabbed a Pokéball out of their small backpack and opened it, revealing an extremely intimidating Golisopod. It jumped out of its confinement and made a three-point landing next to its trainer, causing the ground around it to shake. As it slowly got up, it became apparent that it was towering over both Alice and Decibel. It looked at the Goth before turning to its trainer, awaiting orders.

"Normally, a Gallade can track down people and Pokémon minds, but with the survivors stuck everywhere and the fact that the grunts are probably all over the place, Lancelot wouldn't be able to find a trace in particular. Thus, I have sent him on rescue duty with the police. That's where this big, bad boy comes in…" Decibel then tapped with force on one of the enormous bug-type's samourai-esque armor plates, causing it to shake around like an excited puppy. "In fault of a stealthy tracer, we'll have a bulky tank."

"Oh, I see…" Said Alice, impressed by the thing's sheer size. If it was as strong as the Gallade and Absol who shared the same master, then surely this Golisopod would have tremendous defences as well.

As Decibel finished showing off their Pokémon to the gothic blonde, their Skarmory then returned into eyesight. It had taken altitude and was flying in circles between the two trainers and a nearby location in the woods. With a grin, Decibel snapped their fingers and began running, with Maelstrom keeping up as well as it possibly could with its mass and its tiny legs. Alice, on the other hand, had less difficulty staying close to the white-maned hero, but she still had to be careful not to trip in debris along the way.

After a few intersections were passed by the rushing group, they arrived at the border between Ward and forest. Eon the Skarmory was still flying around silently, most probably trying not to alert whatever it had discovered.

Decibel had decided to stop their course before actually entering the forest, preferring to wait for Alice and Maelstrom to catch up beforehand. Once the two had finally arrived, then the dark coat-wearing trainer began to explain their plan of attack.

"Alright… assuming that this is a Meteor settlement or gathering, then we shall attack it. Trainer, are you willing to attack human beings?"

The calm with which the question was asked – as well as the question itself – made Alice feel a bit uneasy before she answered, cold sweat forming on her forehead.

"Well... no? I don't like hurting people." She responded slowly, looking at the ground. Decibel then frowned in slight disappointment before turning to their Golisopod, who was ducking behind a pile of rubble, presumably in an attempt to camouflage itself from the perspective of their target, placing its body to make its plates look like broken concrete.

"Alright. Maelstrom, we're doing much of the work, then. First, you're going to rush into them, using Aqua Jet to take them by surprise. Then, I'll bring Mercury and Eon to assist you. Then, Alice, you will come next and slow down as much fighters they have as you can. If all goes down as I think it will, then we'll be able to take a few prisoners and question them on the cause of this mess."

"Wait…" Alice interrupted Decibel with a questioning frown and a worried tone. "You're going to have a Golisopod, a Skarmory and an Absol attack people? Can they hold back enough not to kill them?" The white-maned trainer then simply stood in silence, blinking at Alice as though they didn't understand the question. Then, they seemed to have a realisation.

"Oh! I see, don't worry one bit! Putting aside accidents, I don't seek to kill them, so we should have enough survivors to interrogate."

Decibel's cheerful expression dropped, however, when they met the Goth's stunned and, quite frankly, horrified stare.

"Oh, I get it. You want me to be more careful with their lives, right?" They questioned, their expression getting more serious with every second passing.

"Yes! We can't just begin to kill them left and right! What would that make us?"

Alice was going to continue, but she flinched upon seeing Decibel's utter furious glare on her. The mere contrast between the energy and friendliness they were displaying only a few seconds ago and the silent fury they were expressing now was quite chilling. It only got worse when they got up and approached the blonde, stopping at only a few inches from her face. They then lifted their right hand in the direction of a ruined building in the Ward.

"You might want to say this to the kid currently trying to crawl her way out of the debris, with a leg crushed under her bed? Or maybe the man a bit further away, mourning his family's deaths, or do you instead want to talk to the brave policewoman's corpse, that I saw getting impaled while trying to save innocents?" With each example given, Decibel's body would shake more and more violently, while Alice would lean slightly backwards. Eventually, though, their apparent anger seemingly vanished in the blink of an eye, with Decibel now sporting a more solemn look.

"I will never actively try to kill if I don't need to. However, I will also never waste my time in favor of saving a few worthless lives. Just yesterday, they almost had you and your friend. One of them found themselves with their skull on a boulder. Would you two rather have been executed as witnesses? You do you, but I won't sympathise with these mass murderers, and I certainly don't expect them to return you the courtesy of doing so."

"And what makes you the judge of the worth of one's life? What makes you different from them, if you think they deserve to die just for being the ones against you? You think just because you made different choices, they do not have the basic right to live?" Alice retorted, figuratively standing her ground.

"Girl…" Decibel sighed, visibly growing impatient. "No one has the right to live. It is a privilege granted by people like soldiers and heroes like me, and to disregard innocent people for the sake of their goals revokes my enemies of this privilege. And to ask your question, what makes me different is that _I_ fight for the innocent's sake, while they only serve their own. If you want my Pokémon to hit less hard, then I can comply, I don't see an issue."

Decibel then turned their attention back to the woods, as the sun was slowly getting higher in the sky.

"Now, we have lost enough time. Come if you want, I am beginning my attack."

They then proceeded to bring their fingers to their mouth in order to whistle loudly, startling Maelstrom on the ground and Eon in the sky. The Golisopod and Skarmory then began moving with frightening vivacity, the former seemingly gliding on a small veil of water of its creation and destroying obstacles in front of it, and the latter dropping from the sky in the direction of their target. Already, Alice could distinctively hear a few screams.

Alice, as she followed Decibel and their Pokémon into battle, was still processing what the white-maned trainer had told her. 'Revoking their enemies of the privilege to live', they had said. This was making her quite upset. Living in Peridot, she knew more than anyone else that one's circumstances often affected one's destiny dramatically. She was herself lucky to have had her mother looking after her, or she would now undoubtedly be in some crappy brothel. That this person had the audacity to completely ignore the human qualities of the Team Meteor members, evil or not, baffled her.

Maelstrom, for its part, had quickly arrived at the place that Eon had scouted. It used its Aqua Jet attack to sneak in on the grunts who were already focused on the Skarmory and took those out. While it was quite big and powerful in its own right, it still preferred to utilise cheaper tactics in order to take any advantage possible.

While his two Pokémon, now helped by the newly arrived Alice and her Buneary, were having a quite one-sided battle with the goons – with only a handful of them being able to release their respective partners and fight back, not that it helped much –, Decibel looked around in suspicion, noting that there were only around five or six of them. It would have been odd, they thought, that Eon wouldn't have taken care of this few on its own.

Lost in their thoughts, however, the white-haired trainer failed to notice that the leader of the bunch of grunts had snuck up on them, and had got a Scolipede out, ready to strike at the distracted trainer…

Hadn't it been for the two shadowy arms which spawned right from their backpack, slashing the giant bug right in its face. The attack, due to being performed without any preparation, lacked any real impact, but the surprise still made the Scolipede back away to avoid the blow.

As Decibel turned around with an uncharacteristic look of genuine fright on their face, a piece of cloth jumped from where the arms had appeared, before landing flat on the ground, in front of its owner. Then, with dark energy surrounding it, the cloth, which looked like a poorly-made Pikachu puppet, slowly rose and menacing, red light began to come from two small holes on its 'chest'.

After Decibel regained their composure, they glared at the Meteor Knight, a member of the elite of their organisation, who had attempted to take their life with such a cowardly move. His costume was quite similar to the grunts', except that a helmet took the place of the usual hoodie, and long, tentacle-like metal appendages sprouted from his back and were designed to bring him his Pokéballs more easily. The Knight reciprocated the look before redirecting it on the strange Pokémon who had just intervened. Decibel grinned and dusted themselves before bringing both hands behind the back of their head. The then arched their hip forward and bent their knees before taking some time to talk.

"Wow, I must say, you have just passed very close to ending me right here and right now. In a way, I am impressed, you have managed to almost outsmart me…" Decibel then sent their head backwards, causing their abundant hair to flow around elegantly. "'Almost', however, is the key word… you hadn't been expecting Mimi to be there, did you?"

"Yes, let's talk about it… what the hell is this thing?" Asked the Knight, notably curious, yet quite creeped out by the thing's eerie appearance. The white-maned trainer now seemed to radiate excitement. Finally, someone would indulge their love of theatrics!

Decibel then lowered their head and the Pikachu-cloth Pokémon simply stood still as its master was about to exaggerate its origins once again.

"From the faraway, mysterious lands of Alola, in the darkest corner of the darkest abandoned merchant assembly you could find, lurked a truly lonely and unhappy soul, hit by the tragedy of being so hideous, that the average mortal eye would not be able to-"

Right in the middle of their speech, however, Decibel found themselves rushed by the Scolipede. Mimi had been distracted by the Knight and, as such, had found itself unable to do anything to defend its trainer. As a result, despite Decibel dodging out of the oversized bug's way, the latter still managed to cause a quite deep cut right into their abdomen.

Falling heavily on the dirt, Decibel kept right hand on their injuries as the Scolipede was ready to jump them again. On the trainer's visage was an expression of a mix of rage and fear. Before it could strike again, though, it was suddenly hit square in the face by an angry, tiny foot which, since it wasn't expecting such an attack, almost sent it to the ground.

Surprised, Decibel looked at the new attacker: it was Alice's Buneary, having just used the Jump Kick attack to save them from quite literally death.

"Yes! Good work, Clumsy!" Yelled the little bunny's trainer from a safe distance.

However, the hit was shrugged off quite easily by the enemy bug-type, who barely seemed fazed by the attack. Now, its attention was focused only on the little Pokémon, who was now recoiling in fright under its gaze.

As the two Pokémon were about to engage in what would definitely not be a fair fight, Mimi suddenly appeared, dragging the unconscious body of the Meteor Knight, and slammed it right into the Scolipede with enough force to make it lose balance and fall to the ground. If the lack of any real facial feature didn't let one judge the Pokémon's emotional state right now, then the sheer brutality with which it moved and attacked certainly didn't translate into calm and serenity.

Rather than stay and fight with the two diminutive Pokémon, however, the bug-type instead grabbed its master with its enormous front claws and used its superior speed to escape the battlefield, just as Maelstrom and Eon were finishing the grunts. Decibel then slowly got up, with a somber expression, examining the copious amount of blood they had lost from the Scolipede's attack. Their darkish coat was beginning to gain a rather large red stain, which would be quite a pain to wash, thought the trainer. The injury didn't go unnoticed by Alice either.

"Oh my God…" She whispered in shock, covering her mouth with her hands. "You need to go to the station! They'll…"

"No…" Said Decibel, with a grimace followed by a resigned frown. "I'll be okay. I just have to recover for a few hours, then I will be fresh to come get this bastard back. I do thank you, though, for your interference…"

Then, the little Pokémon known as Mimi walked, or more accurately, glided, to its trainer's side before jumping back into their bag. Maelstrom then gave Alice a small nod before following it's trainer as well while Eon took off once more, presumably to resume its scouting.

"Oh, one thing…" Decibel added with a tired, but kind look. "These goons should be able to give you some information regarding the cause of all this. Interrogate them, and when I come back, you'll share your intel with me, alright?"

Alice nodded before going in the direction of the defeated grunts with Clumsy. She then ordered her Buneary to grab one of them and to drag it around as she tried to do the same. However, the task was a bit too arduous for the skinny young woman, and she resigned to only having one person to interrogate for later.

As for the rest, she figured that the Police could take care of them. For now, she needed rest, and she wanted to check on her friend.


	18. Lucia: The Coral Ward

Day 3, 8:00

As she traversed the small tunnel-like construct separating the Coral and Obsydia Wards, Lucia hesitantly turned around to watch behind her, in the direction that Vero had taken earlier.

She was a bit unsure of his well-being at the moment, she couldn't deny that. The boy had more than enough pride for two and then some, but the situation he was in wasn't like anything she – or anyone else, for the matter – had ever seen in the past. However, if he really wanted to go in the plants to search for someone who had probably already either fled to safety or, well, _died_, she couldn't do anything to stop him.

For her part, she was going to enjoy a bit of well-deserved safety after the mess that had been her last week. Right as she entered the next Ward, she began to recall what she had heard about it.

The Coral Ward, the smallest one in Reborn City. It was situated at the very south of the city, while there was the sea at the west and the Byxbysion Wall at the east. Its main function in the past had been to serve as the region's main harbor, but as the waters around the city became more and more polluted, to the point that it would almost eat away the hulls of the ships, the Ward gradually ceased activity and eventually became the practically abandoned husk it now is. Sure, there were still people living there, but besides the Pokémart and the Pokémon Center, not one of the inhabitants actually worked there.

Sure enough, when she got a good look at the area once she got out, the best way to describe what she was seeing was 'desolate'. Much like in Peridot, the buildings that were visible were hardly in good conditions, eroded from all angles and with several holes in the abandoned ones' walls. However, it was also a much cleaner Ward, without all of the trash and filth that afflicted the more populated one.

Another thing worth noting was the weird purple-colored mist that was floating all around the place. After a few seconds, a surge of nausea suddenly crept into Lucia, which she suspected came from the fog. So much for rest, she thought, since she had come from an area attacked by crazed plants to a barely inhabited one with sick feelings-inducing stuff in the air… At least, she could still try to find the Pokémon Center.

As she moved to the west in the direction of the only route currently available for her, the white coat-wearing trainer moved towards the shore, passing in front of a rather large warehouse before Lucia caught the sight of a woman standing on a narrow dock.

She was rather tall, with blue, elegant clothing which no doubt came from a pretty talented designer – not that Lucia cared, though. Her hair was of a beautiful turquoise which, coupled with its length, looked like ocean waves undulating on her back. She was also holding a tissue to her mouth and nose, presumably to diminish the effects of the sick feeling-inducing mist.

As for her current demeanor, though, she appeared to be in a state of distress and she was staring at a fixed point away from the dock, which did not go unnoticed by Lucia. As the latter kept on approaching, she could see what was concerning her so much: an Oshawott was standing on a rather narrow lighthouse's pillar, and it was watching around itself for ways to escape, surrounded by the extremely toxic water. When the blue-wearing woman took notice of Lucia's presence, however, her face immediately relaxed and she adopted a kind smile, although her worry had not quite exited her expression.

"Oh, hello there. I hadn't seen you!" The lady exclaimed.

"No probs. The name's Lucia, what's yours?" Responded the young woman, extending her hand for a handshake.

"I… I am Amaria, pleased to meet you!"

At first, Amaria had looked surprised when Lucia asked for her name. The dark-haired trainer assumed that she might be a famous person in Reborn.

"Do you think you could help me? This poor thing is stuck there, and I can't reach it!" Amaria almost cried out, bringing her hands to her chest.

'_Jeez, stop the melodrama, lady…'_ thought Lucia, even though she was admittedly feeling quite worried for the water-type Pokémon. She then passed in mind all of the Pokémon she had caught to date. Iron Fist? No, he's a fire-type. Sonic? What could she even do? Gears wouldn't do much either; it's not as if it could easily carry heavy weights in the air. Before she could answer, however, a voice made itself known with quite the volume.

"Well, if you do not mind me interrupting, I _do _have somebody who could help your little fellow there…"

Lucia practically jumped around in surprise from the unexpectedness, then she got a good look at the newcomer with a frustrated frown. From the clothes he wore, Lucia could never have told whether he was a guy or a girl, but judging by his quite pronounced – and exposed – musculature, she opted for the guy option. Just like Amaria seemingly had blue as her general color scheme, this boy's was purple. He had a hand resting on his hip as his other one was at his chin, with an amused look. The most puzzling question for Lucia, however, was how the _hell_ he could sneak on them both, especially her who had just arrived.

Seeing both of Lucia and Amaria's confused looks, the boy cleared his throat and pointed upwards, more as a way to tell them to wait than to actually designate anything.

"Sorry, my name is Cain. You may know me, miss." He looked quite calm, Lucia noticed. Amaria, for her part, seemed to indeed recognize him as her visage went even more joyful than it was before.

"Your name is familiar, indeed…" She then redirected her gaze towards the poor Oshawott currently trapped in the middle of the poisonous bay. "You said that you had something to help?"

"Oh, I have plenty of stuff to help in a ton of situation, trust me, and it includes this one…" Cain then got a Super Ball out of his small bag hanging at his side before getting the Pokémon which was inside back out.

Once the light resulting of the opening of the Ball dissipated, a pile of multi-colored sludge was now on the ground, undulating around. Lucia took a second or two to realize that the pile of sludge was actually a Pokémon. It had what vaguely resembled a face, with eye and a mouth, except that there were some purple teeth coming out of the latter, which the young woman was sure that it wouldn't be pleasant to be bitten by.

"See, this is my Grimer. Normally, as you probably guessed, the waters around here would be harmful to any swimming Pokémon. Even Magikarp, known for its survivability, fled. However, a poison-type Pokémon like him will not be inconvenienced at all!" Cain seemed to like exposing his thoughts when he had an idea, or maybe he just liked to talk. Lucia wasn't sure. "Now, please retrieve this Oshawott!"

The sludge-made monster, obeying its master, then jumped into the toxic mixture that some would call water and, just like Cain said, it was completely unaffected by the various toxins there. In short order, it was able to swim to the trapped water-type, who seemed doubtful about riding the Grimer for an instant. After a few growls were exchanged between the two, though, the Oshawott complied and was then brought safely to the dock where the three trainers were standing with various expressions, from relief for Amaria to mild awe for Lucia. Cain, for his part, was proudly waiting for his own Pokémon to return to his side.

"Well, looks like this issue is dealt with. Now, excuse me, but I've got to go…" The purple-themed trainer stated with an air of levity before turning back and walking further down in the Ward.

"Hey, where are you going, exactly?" Lucia asked with an eyebrow lifted.

"Excuse me?"

"I mean, what were you gonna do?"

"Oh, I see…" He cleared his throat before answering. "When the plants began to appear in Obsydia, I saw two of the terrorist group Team Meteor running towards here, so I was looking for them."

At this, Lucia's mind began to make some connections. A pair of bad guys? From Obsydia? When the attack began?

She then looked around her, and she noticed that there were a lot of warehouse in Coral, just like the one where the idiot said the old day-care couple would be hidden…

"Wait! I may know something about where they could be…" Mumbled Lucia, not speaking loud enough for the boy in front of her to understand her well. Seeing his confused expression, she clarified her thoughts before continuing her train of thoughts. "Maybe we could search for them together, you know? If they are terrorists, like you say, we may need to be two in order to deal with them."

Cain's eyebrows raised as he considered her offer, and he began to slowly nod. He then sported a cocky smile before giving Lucia a thumbs up.

"Alright, I think it's a good idea. We're gonna do some crazy stuff together, you'll see!" The young woman then smiled in return, glad that he accepted her proposition without arguing much…

Until she realised the innuendo he had made.

"Wait, what kind of stuff are you talking about?"

"Any you can think of, love." He then winked at her jokingly, which caused her to pout like a frustrated child. Amaria, who was still observing the interactions between the two, giggled a little before calming down.

When Lucia and Cain began to move in their search, though, the dark-haired girl noticed that something was following them from behind: the rescued Oshawott, who was clumsily walking just behind Cain.

"Looks like the little fellow likes you, young man!" Exclaimed Amaria, who was looking at the little Pokémon with an expression typical of the people who were in vicinity of an adorable pet.

"What? No, go away, I'm a poison person, alright? Go with her, instead, she's a water trainer!" Said Cain, but without much conviction behind his words. He then moved from side to side to create some distance between him and Oshawott, only for the latter to make a few steps in order to approach him again. "Ugh, I'm not getting rid of you, huh?"

"Why don't you keep it? I mean, a starter would definitely be good, right? Even if it isn't a poison type…" Lucia stated simply. At this, the purple trainer sighed and shrugged with a smile on his face before he took a Pokéball to capture the little water-type. It didn't take long to convince and catch the Oshawott, which Cain quickly put in his bag before turning to Lucia. Without a word, they agreed to go on with searching for the Meteor grunts and the old couple.

Amaria, for her part, waved her hand in her direction before moving herself.

"Well, until next time, it has been nice meeting you both. I'm going back into Obsydia, now, Florinia has asked for support up there…"

At this, Lucia felt a brief lapse of worry go through her. Wasn't Vero already helping her out? On the other hand, maybe she had called Amaria before he managed to reunite with her, so there wasn't really a reason to be concerned too much.

Thus, Lucia and Cain went on their way to the deeper parts of the Coral Ward as Amaria departed in the direction of Obsydia.


End file.
